f.;>>;"""''^HpE  ^  TALE  H^^^^M 

lllrE'HICH    ERIC  l-f  SB;  ntBB 


FORCED    TO    FIGHT 


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FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

THE   TALE   OF  A   SCHLESWIG 
DANE 


BV 

ERICH    ERICHSEN 


NEW    YORK 

ROBERT   M.    McBRIDE   &   Co. 

1917 


Translated  from  the  Danish  by 
INGEBORG   LUND 


PRINTED   IN  GREAT  BRITAIN 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  FOR 
THE  HUNS 


I 

He  was  a  boy  at  the  time  when  I  first  met 
him — a  little  lad  of  four,  with  sun-bleached 
hair  and  bright  eyes  ;  a  child  of  the  fields  and 
the  soil,  of  the  stable  and  the  barn. 

We  were  sitting  that  day  above  a  roadside 
ditch,  the  bright  summer  sun  shining  down 
upon  us,  and  around  us  the  fragrance  of  wild 
roses  in  the  hedges.  I  had  to  tell  him  stories, 
but  they  all  had  to  be  about  noble  knights  clad 
in  gilded  armour  and  carrying  good  gleaming 
swords.  The  knights  all  had  to  slay  the  wicked 
dragon  and  rescue  the  fair  princess.  Unless 
they  did  that,  neither  they  nor  the  stories  were 
any  good. 

All  the  time  while  I  was  telling  him  these 
tales  his  ardent,  enraptured  eyes  were  fastened 
upon  me,  while  his  soft  and  yielding  child's 
mouth  looked  like  a  big  note  of  interrogation. 


3717C0 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

I  saw  him  again  in  July  in  the  first  year  of 
the  war.  He  was  then  a  happy  and  light- 
hearted  young  man  of  twenty-four  ;  straight 
and  strong,  heavy  in  limb  and  firm  in  step. 
He  had  that  confidence  and  calm  in  all  his  move- 
ments which  is  common  to  those  who  own  the 
ground  they  walk  on. 

His  face  was  bronzed  by  the  sun  and  hardened 
by  all  kinds  of  wind  and  weather.  The  glance 
of  his  blue-grey  eyes  was  open  and  fearless, 
as  in  those  who  are  used  to  seeing  far  and  dis- 
tinguishing clearly,  and  his  voice,  when  speaking 
the  language  of  his  childhood  and  youth,  was 
gentle  and  rich. 

His  father's  homestead  stood  on  one  of  the 
downs  overlooking  the  fjord.  He  had  been  born 
there,  and  his  father  and  grandfather  before 
him,  and  their  forefathers,  for  as  long  as  the 
family  could  be  traced  back. 

He  came  of  that  good,  sound  peasant  stock 
that  has  drawn  its  nourishment  from  the  soil, 
and  that  looks  upon  each  foot-space  of  ground, 
each  little  hummock  of  earth,  as  a  sacred 
treasure  that  fills  the  mind  with  joy  and  the  heart 
with  love. 

His  glance  had  absorbed  the  green  of  the  fields 
and  the  blue  of  the  fjord,  the  golden  brightness 
of  the  corn  and  the  white  sheen  of  the  church 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  3 

tower,  both  when  the  sun  rose  and  when  it  set 
behind  the  downs. 

His  mind  had  drunk  from  the  pure  source  of 
fidelity,  and  whether  guiding  the  plough  or 
swinging  the  scythe,  in  the  barn  or  the  loft, 
he  had  learnt  to  sing  that  ^  which  his  father  and 
grandfather  always  kept  in  their  hearts,  because 
it  was  the  greatest  thing  in  their  lives  and  held 
their  dearest  hopes. 

When  I  saw  him  then  he  was  lying  on  a 
heather  bank  in  the  summer  sunshine  and  gazing 
up  at  the  southward-drifting  clouds. 

He  had  been  telling  me  about  the  homestead 
on  the  downs  above  the  fjord,  about  the  girl  he 
loved  and  who  belonged  to  the  same  countryside 
as  he,  born  of  the  same  soil  and  of  the  same 
steadfast  race,  that  might  sometimes  be  silent 
but  would  never  forget. 

With  his  eyes  he  followed  the  clouds  racing 
across  the  blue  vault  of  the  sky.  He  saw  them 
vanish  under  the  skyHne,  and  sent  a  greeting 
with  them,  as  they  sped  on,  to  all  that  he  held 
most  dear — the  golden  rye  and  the  green  forests, 
the  blue  fjord  and  the  white  church  towers, 
and  to  the  girl  to  whom  he  had  given  his  young 
and  joyous  love. 

I  remember  him  on  the  day  when  he  stretched 

^  /.(?.,  the  Danish  national  songs. 


4  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

out  his  hand  to  me  to  say  good-bye  before  going 
home  to  the  farm  that  he  loved  and  that  he  was 
to  guard  and  tend  like  his  father  before  him 
when  the  time  came  for  him  to  take  possession 
of  it. 

He  stood  facing  me  with  radiant  eyes  and 
smiling  lips.  His  voice  rang  out  with  such  joy 
and  freedom  that  it  seemed  as  if  he  was  shout- 
ing the  words  across  wide  fields.  He  was  so 
young  and  handsome,  so  gallant  and  strong. 
He  looked  as  if  he  were  going  out  to  face  life 
with  firm  steps  and  happy  thoughts  because 
he  knew  that  he  and  life  were  on  the  best  of 
terms. 

He  was  the  finest  picture  I  have  ever  seen  of 
youth  endowed  with  the  will  and  the  power  to 
do  something  good  and  great — of  youth  full  of 
faith  and  hope,  health  and  truth,  uprightness 
and  honesty. 

He  was  the  incarnation  of  the  growing,  promis- 
ing future  :  the  fermenting  grape  that  yields 
precious  wine,  containing  the  strength  and 
fragrance  of  many  a  glorious  summer. 

I  saw  his  face  once  more  for  the  last  time 
when  the  train  glided  away  amongst  the  downs 
near  by.  I  had  a  last  glance  from  his  clear, 
steadfast  eyes.  I  had  the  last  smile  from  two 
strong  and  firmly  chiselled  lips. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  5 

I  never  saw  that  glance  nor  that  smile 
again. 

This  summer  he  was  sitting  one  day  in  my 
room. 

His  right  coat-sleeve  hung  empty  and  was 
tucked  into  his  pocket.  His  body  was  limp  and 
shrunken,  his  chest  flat,  his  shoulders  bent.  He 
sat  hunched  up  like  one  newly  risen  from  a  long 
and  severe  illness,  and  his  face,  which  bore  traces 
of  sorrows  and  hardships,  looked  like  an  old 
man's. 

His  hair  was  white  at  the  temples,  his  skin 
sallow  and  shrivelled,  and  it  looked  as  if  it  had 
by  main  force  been  stretched  over  his  sharp 
bones.  There  were  deep  lines  on  his  forehead, 
his  lips  were  pale  and  thin,  and  the  lines  from  his 
nose  down  to  the  corners  of  his  mouth  were 
long  and  like  two  deep  scars. 

His  blue-grey  eyes,  which  before  had  been  so 
bright  and  fearless,  were  the  strangest  thing 
about  him. 

Now  they  lay  deep  under  two  sharp  eye- 
ridges,  as  if  they  had  been  pressed  back  into 
their  sockets  by  force,  and  the  look  in  them  was 
at  the  same  time  staring  and  distant. 

They  never  rested  at  any  definite  point.  It 
was  as  though  there  was  before  them  a  constant 
vision  that  kept  on  pursuing  them  and  never 


6  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

left  them  any  peace — as  if  he  saw  some  dread 
thing  from  which  he  could  not  escape  that 
terrified  him  and  drove  him  to  despair. 

Now  and  then  he  would  close  his  eyes  and  pass 
his  left  hand  over  his  brow.  The  hand  was  long 
and  thin — all  its  sinews  could  be  seen  stretched 
under  the  skin  like  violin  strings  ;  they  looked 
as  if  they  lay  and  quivered  and  could  not  find 
rest. 

He  had  been  sent  home  from  a  hospital  in 
the  Rhine  country,  where  he  had  lain  for  nearly 
three  months  tortured  by  the  fever  of  his  wounds 
and  near  to  death. 

He  was  now  to  be  sent  to  Norway  to  regain 
his  health,  if  possible,  in  the  mountain  air,  and 
to  find  healing  for  a  suffering  mind  that  seldom 
left  him  any  peace,  day  or  night. 

We  had  been  sitting  a  while  talking  about 
many  things.  We  had  talked  about  his  home, 
his  mother  and  father,  his  fiancee,  and  every- 
thing that  lay  nearest  his  heart. 

We  had  not  yet  exchanged  a  word  about  the 
war.  I  avoided  the  subject  continually.  It 
seemed  to  me  that  it  would  be  like  digging  dirty 
fingers  into  a  wound  that  was  still  bleeding 
and  suppurating. 

There  was  something  distant  all  the  time  about 
his  way  of  speaking.     It  was  evident  that  his 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  7 

words  and  his  thoughts  mostly  went  each  their 
own  way,  and  that  his  wandering  and  distant 
look  beheld  something  quite  different  from  that 
of  which  he  spoke. 

Then  a  silence  fell  between  us.  I  really 
could  not  think  of  anything  else  to  talk  about. 
He  sat  with  closed  eyes  and  pressed  his  hand 
against  them. 

Sometimes  a  fit  of  trembling  seized  him.  He 
stooped  as  if  he  expected  a  thrust  from  behind, 
a  thrust  which  he  knew  must  inevitably  come 
and  which  he  could  not  ward  oflf.  His  lips 
quivered,  and  the  lines  about  his  mouth  grew 
deeper  and  sharper. 

At  last  he  spoke.  His  glance  hurriedly  sought 
mine,  but  immediately  after  it  was  again  caught 
by  something  that  made  it  falter  and  hesitate, 
and  as  though  filled  with  apprehension. 

"  It  was  the  horror  of  horrors.  You  cannot 
understand  it  at  all,  you  who  are  living  safely 
in  your  own  land  and  growing  rich  on  the 
misery  of  others.  You  can  have  no  conception 
of  the  crushing  wretchedness,  the  fathomless 
despair,  the  appalling  inhumanity,  that  we  have 
had  to  see,  we  who  have  had  to  fight  for  a 
country  that  had  made  us  its  subjects  by 
force. 

"  I  can  imagine  suffering,  and  suffering  every- 


8  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

thing,  for  that  which  is  beautiful  and  sacred  and 
eternal.  I  can  imagine  that  one  might  in  that 
case  look  back  upon  what  one  had  seen  of  horror 
and  dread  as  upon  something  great  and  exalted, 
because  in  its  intention  it  was  dedicated  to  an 
ideal  so  precious,  so  dear  that  one  could  not  bear 
to  lose  it — something  beyond  life  and  time, 
something  filled  with  eternal  hopes  and  longings. 

"  I  can  imagine  all  this. 

"  I  can  imagine  still  more. 

"  I  can  imagine  that  a  man's  mind  might 
be  filled  with  a  holy  pride  in  all  that  he  had 
done — so  that  he  could  look  back  upon  every 
hour  of  suffering,  every  moment  of  horror, 
bought  with  fire  and  murder,  as  upon  something 
that  had  been  consecrated  by  justice  and  the 
beautiful  relentlessness  of  eternal  retribution. 

"  I  can  imagine  that. 

"  But  when  it  is  all  a  mere  matter  of  duty  ! 
Cold,  inevitable  duty  !  Do  you  understand  now 
what  a  chalice  of  suffering  and  torture  one  has 
to  drink  when  it  is  only  that  ?  Not  just  at 
the  actual  moment.  You  do  not  think  at  the 
time  ;  you  only  act.  There  is  nothing  human 
left  in  you  when  you  are  in  the  midst  of  the 
tumult. 

"  You  fight  for  your  life.  You  are  driven  on 
by  forces  you  have  never  known  before  and  that 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  9 

you  will  never  learn  to  understand  in  all  their 
horror. 

"  Passions  and  instincts,  hot  as  one's  blood, 
must  have  been  lying  dormant  in  one's  mind, 
and  when  they  are  set  free  by  the  licence  of 
war,  they  flame  up  with  all  primeval  man's 
desire  to  kill  and  destroy. 

"  You  laugh  as  if  for  sheer  joy  every  time  you 
see  a  body  fall,  the  light  fade  away  from  a  pair 
of  eyes,  or  the  flames  devouring  and  wasting 
what  human  skill  and  human  art  have  brought 
forth  in  joy  or  in  pain. 

"  You  proclaim  your  joy  in  wild  shouts,  while 
your  heart  hammers  and  your  cheeks  burn  and 
beat  as  if  you  were  caught  up  to  the  highest 
state  of  bliss. 

"  I  do  not  understand  it.  But  it  is  the  glory 
of  glories  at  the  actual  moment.  The  extreme 
height  of  happiness.  Seething  and  spell-weaving 
passions   dissolve  into  a  state   of  intoxicating 

joy- 

"  But  afterwards — afterwards  ! 

"  I  shall  never  be  able  to  find  words  to 
express  the  pain  and  torment,  the  shame  and 
despair  of  it  all.  I  always  feel  as  if  I  must  hide 
away  from  myself,  or  escape  from  it  all  with  a 
bare-faced  lie,  or  else  fall  on  my  knees  and 
humbly  implore  God's  forgiveness. 


10  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

"  I  could  never  look  my  comrades  in  the  face. 
It  always  seemed  to  me  that  they  would  be  able 
to  look  down  into  the  unclean  depths  of  an 
unclean  soul,  and  that  they  were  afraid  I  should 
see  the  same  in  them — all  of  us  who  had  our 
homes  on  the  same  dear  soil,  all  of  us  who  had 
done  our  duty^  and  killed  those  who  had  never 
injured  that  which  was  dear  and  precious  to  us^ 
or  that  which  was  our  very  life  and  our  hope 
and  future. 

"  Wherever  I  went  my  comrades  and  superiors 
always  called  me  '  The  silent  Dane.' 

"  They  were  right.    I  was  silent. 

"  How  could  it  all  make  me  anything  else  ? 

"  Do  not  horrors,  in  their  paralysing  relentless- 
ness,  always  make  one  silent  ?  " 

He  ceased  speaking  a  while,  and  again  closed 
his  eyes.  Two  red,  burning  spots  came  out  on 
his  cheeks  and  a  quiver  passed  over  his  face. 
His  body  sank  down  still  more  in  the  chair. 
He  looked  as  if  all  his  muscles  were  slack  and  as 
if  he  had  no  strength  to  straighten  his  sunken 
chest. 

After  a  while  he  spoke  again  and  his  voice 
grew  husky  as  if  he  were  on  the  verge  of  tears. 

"  I  do  not  count  that  as  anything." 

He  looked  down  at  the  empty  sleeve  with  a 
glance  of  indifference. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  ii 

"  Many  would  say  I  came  off  cheaply ;  I 
think  so  myself.  But  all  the  thoughts  that 
rack  and  torment  one's  mind,  early  and  late.  .  .  . 
It  is  said  that  remorse  can  torture  a  soul  to 
madness.  I  believe  that  the  thoughts  and 
memories  that  day  and  night  tear  at  me  hke 
red-hot  pincers  in  living  flesh  are  a  hundred 
times  more  merciless.  From  the  moment  when 
I  regained  consciousness  in  the  hospital  I  have 
felt  that  there  is  a  bond  between  these  memories 
and  myself  which  nothing  can  break.  They 
meet  me  in  my  dreams,  making  a  hell  of  my 
nights  and  turning  the  dark  into  an  abyss  of 
horror. 

"  I  lie  in  torment  until  the  day  breaks  without 
finding  rest.  I  stare  up  at  the  merciful  light  of 
day  and  yet  find  neither  rest  nor  peace. 

"  I  meet  them  in  human  smiles  and  sounds 
of  joy.  I  meet  them  in  a  child's  glance  or  in 
the  kind  words  of  my  dear  people  at  home. 
Wherever  I  look  I  encounter  them. 

"  It  does  not  matter  what  I  see  or  what  I  hear. 
There  is  always  a-  bridge  connecting  it  with  all 
the  things  I  have  had  to  witness  or  take  part  in. 

"  A  woman  in  a  street  door,  and  I  see  the 
houses  I  had  to  help  to  set  on  fire,  whilst  bullets 
took  innocent  lives  or  the  flames  devoured  their 
bodies. 


12  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

"  A  child  crying  ;  and  I  see  innocent  babies, 
whose  lives  were  destroyed  amidst  cold  and 
terror,  or  whose  existence  ebbed  away  on  the 
point  of  a  bayonet. 

'^  A  man  smiling.  I  see  a  distorted  face,  full 
of  hate  to  the  last,  its  glance  evil  and  cursing, 
even  after  the  heart  itself  has  long  ceased 
beating.  .  .  •. 

"  Great  God  !  to  think  that  we  have  been  born 
with  such  passions  !  That  we  should  destroy 
and  kill  and  murder  till  we  could  not  go  on  for 
very  weariness,  and  take  life  after  life  in  order 
to  save  our  own  !  " 

He  clenched  his  hand  in  the  air,  and,  while 
his  face  stiffened  under  a  sallow  paleness,  he 
repeated,  in  a  voice  that  seemed  to  force  its  way 
through  his  throat  : 

"  Great  God  in  heaven  !  That  we  have  been 
born  with  such  instincts  and  that  all  these 
horrors  should  come  upon  my  head  !  I,  who 
never  wished  the  least  harm  to  anyone  !  .  .  . 

"  Great  God  !  that  it  became  my  duty — 
my  duty! — to  be  like  that  to  people  who  never 
wished  harm  to  anything  dear  to  me — never 
thought  any  evil  against  that  which  holds  all 
my  hopes  and  my  longings  !  " 

He  fell  back  with  his  hand  pressed  against 
his  eyes.     His  face  was  distorted  as  if  by  the 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  13 

horror  of  a  vision   of  blood   and  fire,  and  he 
groaned  heavily  and  hopelessly. 


II 


That  evening  and  during  the  evenings  that 
came  after  it  he  told  me,  sometimes  calmly 
and  sometimes  with  excitement,  about  all  those 
experiences  that  had  whitened  his  hair  and  worn 
out  his  body,  and  made  him  an  old  man,  though 
he  had  not  yet  completed  his  twenty-seventh 
year. 

I  am  telling  his  story  as  he  told  it  to  me. 

The  words  are  mine,  but  all  that  gives  life 
to  them,  the  moods  and  thoughts,  the  hopes  and 
sufferings,  the  abasement  of  the  soul  and  the 
horror  of  the  mind — all  these  are  his.  I  have 
neither  added  nor  taken  away.  For  it  can  not 
be  more  saturated  with  grief  and  horror  than 
it  was.  Sometimes  I  had  to  get  up  and  leave 
him  or  ask  him  to  cease. 

It  was  so  far  and  away  beyond  all  reason 
and  understanding,  all  that  he  had  Hved  through 
and  endured,  and  often  it  was  impossible  to 
see  anything  human  behind  it. 

"  I  came  home  at  the  end  of  July,   191 4," 


14  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

he  began.  ^'  You  remember  that  even  then, 
before  we  said  good-bye  to  each  other,  I  was 
rather  anxious  about  what  might  come,  and 
when  I  saw  my  people  at  home  my  anxiety 
grew.  It  is  true  that  none  of  us  said  anything 
that  could  add  to  the  anxiety,  but  when  we 
read  the  papers  and  what  they  said  about  the 
state  of  tension  we  looked  at  each  other,  and  our 
looks  really  said  all  that  we  had  not  the  courage 
to  put  into  words. 

"  I  remember  that  one  evening  a  day  or  two 
after  I  had  arrived,  my  fiancee  and  I  were  sitting 
in  the  garden  on  the  seat  under  the  old  flag- 
staff. It  has  continually  been  renewed,  but  no 
flag  has  been  hoisted  upon  it  for  fifty  years — it 
has  only  stood  ready.  ... 

"  I  remember  how  we  sat  there  and  looked 
down  at  the  corn-covered  fields,  wreathed  about 
with  scented  hedges,  and  with  the  light  blue 
of  the  fjord  behind  them. 

"  The  deepest  peace  seemed  to  brood  over 
that  evening.  The  air  was  mild  and  soft,  and 
easy  to  breathe.  Sitting  there  and  listening 
to  the  healthy  breathing  of  the  soil  seemed  to 
me  to  fill  one's  mind  with  a  wonderful  calm,  and 
quiet. 

"  A  last  streak  of  sunshine  passed  over  the 
tops  ot  the  trees  on  the  other  side  of  the  fjord. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  15 

I  sat  and  watched  how  after  a  time  the  light 
faded  away,  while  the  evening  clouds  in  the  west 
lay  sleeping,  with  golden  rims  that  gradually 
sank  away  into  the  purest  crimson. 

"  Suddenly  my  fiancee  seized  my  hand  in  a  hard 
and  violent  grip.  I  turned  to  her  and  smiled. 
I  thought  she  meant  that  I  dreamt  too  much 
and  spoke  too  little. 

"  But  when  I  looked  at  her  face  I  grew 
frightened  and  asked  her  if  she  were  ill.  She  was 
pale,  and  her  eyes  had  a  strange,  staring  and 
distant  look. 

"  When  our  eyes  met  she  bent  her  head,  and 
again  gripping  my  hand  tightly  she  said  in  a 
voice  that  could  hardly  find  utterance  :  *  Why 
don't  we  say  it  straight  out  to  each  other  ?  ' 

"  I  turned  away  my  head.  I  understood,  as 
I  had  understood  during  these  last  few  days, 
what  it  was  that  tormented  her.  But  it  seemed 
as  if  I  could  not  find  the  words.  And  why  seek 
for  them  ?  We  did  not  need  them.  There  is 
no  need  for  anyone  to  speak  of  that  which  is  in 
everybody's  thoughts. 

"  But  she  said  again  :  '  Why  don't  we  say 
it  straight  out  to  each  other  ?  ' 

"  I  turned  round  to  her  and  put  my  arm  about 
her,  and  she  leaned  her  head  against  my  shoulder 
I  could  feel  that  her  body  was  trembUng  and  tdiat 


i6  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

she  was  weeping.  I  sat  silent  awhile  and  then, 
as  I  drew  her  closer  to  myself  and  stroked  her 
cheek,  I  said  to  her  :  '  Let  us  hope  that  it  will 
blow  over.' 

"  And  because  I  believed  it  would  comfort 
her,  I  said,  as  I  tried  to  smile  :  '  I  am  certain  it 
will  blow  over.  You  just  wait  and  see  ;  nobody 
will  dare  to  do  it  when  it  really  comes  to  the 
point  of  being  serious.' 

"  She  looked  at  me  ;  she  said  nothing,  but 
I  could  read  in  her  face  that  she  knew  I  was 
saying  something  quite  different  from  what  I 
meant. 

"  She  rose  slowly  and  stood  for  a  moment 
looking  intently  at  me  ;  then  she  threw  her 
arms  round  me  and  clung  closely  to  me.  With 
her  lips  close  to  my  ear  she  moaned  softly  : 
^  I  will  not  lose  you  !    I  will  not  lose  you  !  ' 

"  I  did  not  answer.  I  passed  my  hand  over 
her  cheek  and  her  shoulder.  I  knew  quite  well, 
of  course,  that  what  I  had  said  to  comfort  her 
was  exactly  what  I  did  not  believe  myself.  I  had 
not  the  least  doubt  that  the  crash  would  come. 

"  I  had  that  strange  feeling  in  my  mind  that 
is  like  the  firm  and  unshakable  conviction  of  a 
presentiment.  It  was  perfectly  clear  to  me  that 
in  a  few  days',  perhaps  in  a  few  hours',  time  the 
disaster  would  be  upon  us,  and  I  should  have 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  17 

to  say  good-bye  to  my  home,  along  with  several 
other  young  men  in  the  neighbourhood.  Perhaps 
to  say  good-bye  for  ever  !  .  .  . 

"  I  dared  not  think  that  thought  down  to  its 
roots. 

"  Then  I  rose  slowly,  put  my  arm  about  her, 
and  kissed  her.  Her  lips  were  cold,  and  I  felt 
how  they  trembled  against  mine. 

"  After  that  we  went  down  through  the  garden 
and  across  the  fields.  A  path  beside  the  hedge 
runs  from  the  farm  down  to  the  fjord.  The  rye 
stood  golden  and  rich  and  full.  Here  and  there 
poppies  flamed  up,  and  the  deep-blue  crowns 
of  the  cornflowers  shone  on  their  climbing  stalks, 
as  if  they  were  standing  on  tip-toe  in  order 
to  peep^out  over  the  heavily  filled  ears  of 
corn. 

'^  We  walked  with  our  arms  round  each  other. 
But  we  were  still  silent,  and  there  was  not  a 
sound  about  us.  We  could  hear  each  other's 
quiet  breathing.  Only  a  grasshopper  in  the 
ditch  played  at  whiles  on  its  tiny  fiddle. 

"  Down  by  the  fjord  we  stood  still  and  looked 
over  its  calm  surface.  We  could  see  a  forest 
steamer  running  out  from  the  opposite  shore. 
We  saw  its  two  lanterns  gleam  Uke  two  big 
shining  pearls.  And  once  we  heard  the  faint 
sound  of  distant  voices  of  laughter  and  merry 


1 8  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

talking.  Soon  after  we  went  home  again,  still 
without  speaking. 

"  Dusk  had  begun  to  fall.  A  pale  mist  was 
rising  over  the  sloping  fields,  and  a  slow  and 
whispering  breath  of  evening  air  sent  a  trembhng 
and  fear-laden  sigh  through  the  heavy  ears  of 
corn. 

"  It  seemed  to  me  that  never  had  the  soil 
about  me  been  so  tenderly  dear  to  me  as  at  that 
moment. 

"  I  felt  a  reverence  towards  it,  as  if  I  were 
walking  on  holy  ground.  I  could  hardly  bear 
to  set  my  foot  on  the  straws  in  the  path. 

"  It  was  all  so  unutterably  dear  to  me.  I  could 
have  put  my  cheek  against  the  warm  earth  as 
against  the  strong  bosom  of  a  loved  woman 
and  wept  out  my  love  in  tears  as  hot  and 
frightened  as  a  child's. 

"  We  went  on  together  past  my  home  and 
along  to  the  local  magistrate's  where  she  kept 
house.  We  met  one  of  the  men  from  the  nearest 
farm  ;  he  greeted  us  with  a  ^  God's  peace,'  as  he 
passed  us.  Usually  he  was  cheery  and  talkative, 
but  that  evening  he  walked  with  a  weary  and 
lurching  step  close  to  the  ditch,  and  his  voice 
was  low  and  anxious. 

"  My  poor  girl  looked  at  me.  Her  eyes  were 
very  bright  and   she  was  not  far  from  tears. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  19 

But  she  said  nothing,  while  she  rested  her  arm 
still  more  heavily  in  mine. 

"  Outside  the  garden  gate  we  stood  holding 
each  other's  hands.  Our  eyes  met  and  she  tried 
to  hold  mine  with  her  look. 

''  Then  she  clasped  me  closely  about  my  neck, 
and  with  her  cheek  against  mine  she  whispered  : 
'  I  will  not  lose  you  !    I  will  not  lose  you  !  ' 

"  I  patted  her  gently  on  the  shoulder  and 
pressed  my  cheek  against  hers. 

"  Then  she  suddenly  loosened  her  hold  of 
me,  pressed  her  hands  against  her  face,. and  ran 
up  through  the  garden  into  the  house.  She  did 
not  turn  round,  not  even  in  the  doorway.  I 
only  saw  a  fluttering  fold  of  her  light  summer 
gown  as  the  door  was  closed. 

"  I  stood  still  awhile  and  looked  about  me. 
The  dusk  had  glided  into  the  pure  deep  blue 
of  a  July  night  and  all  the  shadows  were  vague 
and  soft.  My  eyes  sought  her  room.  I  had 
expected  to  see  a  light  appear,  but  it  remained 
in  darkness.  The  window  was  open,  and  the 
night  wind  played  with  the  chaste  white  curtain. 

"  Then  I  turned  and  walked  home  !  I  thought 
at  first  of  going  into  the  house,  but  I  went  into 
the  garden. 

"  I  don't  know  how  it  came  about,  but 
suddenly  I  glanced  at  the   naked  flagstaff,  and 


20  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

looked  at  it  from  the  foot  up  to  the  knob 
at  the  top,  where  the  bright  weather-cock 
pointed  northwards. 

"  I  felt  its  emptiness  like  a  physical  pain.  It 
stood  there  as  the  symbol  of  something  both  old 
and  new,  stirring  at  that  moment  within  myself 
— something  that  ran  like  a  chill  through  my 
mind,  but  which  I  am  not  able  to  put  into  words. 
It  came  nearest  to  that  feeling  of  forsakenness 
that  used  to  seize  us  when  as  children  we  had 
gone  too  far  from  home  to  find  our  way  back 
again. 

"  From  the  flagstaff  my  eyes  wandered  over 
the  fjord  to  the  downs  on  the  other  side.  The 
changing  fields  and  the  green  of  the  forest 
glided  away  into  the  same  blue  haze.  Here  and 
there  a  light  gleamed  out  like  a  little  child's 
eyes  bHnking  in  the  night,  so  trustfully  and 
confidingly. 

"  And  then  my  glance  sought  the  pure  sky 
of  the  summer  night. 

"  I  let  it  wander  from  horizon  to  horizon, 
watching  how  star  after  star  came  out,  noticed 
how  their  colour  varied  from  pale  golden 
to  almost  glowing  red,  and  how  their  shining 
gradually  grew  keener  and  keener,  while  the 
vault  beyond  them  seemed  to  grow  clearer  and 
deeper  and  more  infinite. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  21 

"  It  seemed  to  me  so  comforting  to  look 
upwards.  I  was  in  kinship  with  all  these  wonders 
— we  came  and  went  under  the  same  Will.  But 
at  the  same  time  they  told  me  how  infinitely 
little  I  mattered  in  all  this  great  unfathomable 
mystery. 

"  Then  I  went  into  the  house. 

"  The  lamp  was  lit  in  the  sitting-room,  but 
the  blinds  had  not  been  pulled  down,  and  the 
window  over-looking  the  garden  was  open. 
Mild  scents  of  flowers  breathed  into  the  room — 
the  scent  of  roses  and  elders  in  the  hedges. 

"  My  mother  sat  leaning  back  in  a  corner  of 
the  sofa  ;  she  had  just  finished  reading  the  news- 
paper which  was  lying  on  the  table  in  front  of 
her,  with  her  spectacles  upon  it.  The  stems 
stood  up  in  the  air,  blinking  in  the  lamplight. 

"  My  father  was  sitting  at  the  writing-table 
smoking  his  pipe.  He  was  writing  and  I  could 
hear  his  heavy  breathing — a  habit  with  him 
when  he  had  a  pen  in  his  hand.  The  quiet  snoring 
of  his  pipe  murmured  through  the  stillness. 

*'  I  went  over  to  my  mother  and  stroked  her 
hair.  She  seized  my  hand  and  pressed  it  hard  : 
*  So  you  have  been  for  a  walk  with  Marie. 
What  did  she  say,  by  the  way  ?  ' 

"  She  spoke  softly  and  again  gripped  my 
hand  tenderly.    I  could  feel  her  hand  trembling. 


22  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  '  She  did  not  say  anything  in  particular,' 
I  answered.    '  She  was  only  .  .  .  ' 

"  '  She  feared  the  worst — the  war — didn't 
she  ?  ' 

"  My  father  turned  from  the  writing-table 
and  his  words  seemed  to  come  as  if  by  a  great 
effort  of  will.  And,  bending  his  head  low,  he 
continued  quietly  :  '  We  all  fear  that,  though 
none  of  us  say  so  straight  out.  May  God  be 
merciful  to  us,  each  and  all !  ' 

"  It  was  the  first  time  that  the  word  '  war ' 
was  mentioned  in  my  home  in  those  days,  and  it 
was  as  if  a  painful  silence  had  been  broken  by 
my  father's  words.  It  seemed  to  me  that  we 
came  closer  to  each  other  all  at  once  and  found 
the  old  open  and  steadfast  confidence  again. 

"  Then  we  talked  about  it  for  a  little  while, 
but  quietly  and  in  anxious  voices.  The  word 
*  war  '  was  not  mentioned  again  ;  we  avoided 
it  or  alluded  to  it  in  other  ways. 

"  '  If  it  does  come,'  we  said,  or  ^  if  things  get 
serious,'  or  '  if  the  worst  should  come  to  the 
worst.' 

"  At  last  my  father  said,  as  he  passed  his 
hand  over  his  deeply-lined  forehead :  ^  Let  us 
pray  to  God  that  He  will  bring  good  out  of  it 
for  us  all — in  our  Saviour's  name.  .  .  . ' 

''  His  head  sank  forward  with  a  quick  move- 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  23 

ment  upon  his  chest  and  my  mother  covered 
her  eyes.  She  pressed  her  lips  closely  together 
like  one  who  is  determined  to  be  strong,  not 
only  against  tears,  but  against  despairing  words 
strugghng  to  find  utterance. 

"  The  room  was  so  quiet  that  a  mere  sigh 
would  have  made  us  tremble. 

"  The  next  day  the  orders  for  mobilisation 
came. 

"  I  was  standing  outside  the  gate  in  the  morn- 
ing, waiting  for  the  postman. 

"  The  road,  white  and  quiet,  was  flooded  in 
sunshine,  dappled  by  the  fleeting  shadows  of 
the  old  poplars. 

"  Suddenly  I  saw  Marie  running  down  the 
middle  of  the  road  from  the  magistrate's  house. 
She  stumbled  once  or  twice  and  looked  as  if 
she  were  going  to  fall.  She  ran  like  one  pursued 
by  something  evil,  and  with  her  arms  stretched 
out  as  if  pleading  for  help. 

"  She  did  not  stop  until  she  had  reached  me 
and  had  flung  her  arms  about  my  neck.  There 
was  a  wheezing  in  her  chest  every  time  she 
breathed,  and  in  a  voice  that  was  almost  sound- 
less she  moaned :  '  It's  coming  now — it's 
coming !  .  .  . ' 

''  I  tried  to  remove  her  arms  from  my  neck. 
I  have  never  cared  much  for  violent  expression 


24  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

of  feelings.     But  I  allowed  her  to  keep  hold 
when  I  saw  her  face. 

"  I  have  never  seen  a  face  stamped  with  such 
helpless  despair  as  hers  was  then,  I  could 
not  recognise  it.  The  eyes  were  rigid  and  dead 
as  if  they  were  made  of  glass,  the  skin  a  sallow 
grey,  and  the  features  distorted  to  plainness. 
She  had  bitten  her  under-lip  until  it  bled.  A 
streak  of  blood  lay  upon  her  chin,  and  a  drop 
of  it  had  trickled  down  upon  her  breast. 

"  Unfortunately  she  was  right.  The  order 
for  mobilisation  came  soon  after.  It  was  my 
duty  to  report  myself  without  unnecessary 
delay  at  the  nearest  railway  station  and  to 
proceed  to  my  garrison  by  the  first  available 
train.    In  my  case  this  meant  going  to  Berlin. 

"  I  remember  the  last  half-hour  before  I 
left  home. 

"  There  was  silence  both  outside  and  in.  An 
arbitrary,  painful  silence  that  caused  a  trembling 
in  one's  chest  and  seemed  to  empty  one's  lungs. 

"  One  or  two  young  fellows  had  come  in  from 
the  nearest  farms  to  ask  for  news,  but  otherwise 
there  was  no  one  about.  The  farms  are  rather 
far  apart  in  our  part  of  the  country,  and  people 
stayed  at  home  looking  after  their  own  affairs. 
We  voluntarily  avoided  each  other  in  those  days, 
so  that  we  might  not  have  to  speak  about  that 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  25 

which  tormented  the  minds  of  all  of  us,  but 
which  we  were  so  painfully  loth  to  believe. 

"  We  had  just  risen  from  our  mid-day  meal. 
My  father  had  said  grace  as  usual,  but  his  voice 
had  faltered  and  scarcely  been  audible.  His 
*  Amen  ! '  sounded  like  a  full-stop  to  something 
beautiful  that  had  come  to  an  end,  and  like  a 
prayer  that  all  that  was  to  come  might  not 
bring  us  too  great  sorrows. 

"  He  was  standing  now  beside  his  writing- 
table,  one  hand  resting  upon  its  surface.  I 
could  see  how  his  hand  shook. 

"  My  mother  was  sitting  on  the  sofa  with  her 
hands  folded  upon  the  table,  and  gazing  straight 
in  front  of  her,  her  eyes  fastened  upon  me  as  if 
she  wanted  to  fix  my  image  for  ever  in  her  mind. 

"  Her  eyes  were  tearless,  and  her  features 
looked  as  if  they  had  stiffened  in  pallor. 

"  I  stood  near  the  window.  I  could  hear  our 
head  man  dragging  out  the  little  hght  dogcart 
and  the  horses  stamping  on  the  stone  flooring. 

"  My  father  turned  round  to  me.  His  face 
was  ashen-grey  and  his  lips  tightly  clenched. 
He  blinked  once  or  twice  and  then  said,  in  a 
voice  that  sounded  as  if  something  broke  now 
and  then  in  his  throat : 

"  '  .  .  .  Well,  whatever  happens  to  you,  my 
lad,  remember  that  you  can  with  perfect  right 


26  FORCED  TO  -FIGHT 

be  called  upon  to  do  your  duty  to  the  utmost. 
It  shall  not  justly  be  said  of  us  here  that  we  did 
not  know  what  duty  was. 

"  ^  I  know,  of  course,  where  your  heart  is. 
I  know,  too,  that  you  could  never  go  out  to  that 
to  which  you  are  now  called  upon  to  go  with 
sacred  enthusiasm.  But  you  can  do  one  thing  ; 
you  can  earn  the  report  that  you  acted  to  the 
last  as  duty  bade  you — even  though  your  heart 
was  cold  and  your  feelings  elsewhere — and  that 
you  gave  your  strength,  your  life  perhaps, 
fairly  and  honestly  to  the  country  you  had 
undertaken  to  serve. 

"  '  Duty,  my  lad,  is  never  deserted  by  the 
man  who  respects  himself  and  his  word,  even  if 
it  hurts  ever  so  much.  We  have  asked  for  it 
ourselves  from  the  others,  early  and  late,  with- 
out growing  weary.  They  did  not  know  what  it 
meant.  They  shall  see  now  that  at  any  rate 
we  understand  what  duty  is  and  how  to  act 
accordingly.' 

"  He  had  put  both  his  hands  upon  my  shoul- 
ders and  looked  into  my  eyes.  I  looked  back  at 
him  calmly  and  steadily.  I  could  feel  my  eyes 
smarting,  but  I  kept  firm  and  strong.  I  did 
not  wish  to  be  the  first  to  be  conquered  by 
tears. 

"  Then   he   kissed   me   on   the   forehead.     It 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  27 

seemed  like  a  consecration  to  me.  I  felt  his 
lips  trembling. 

"  He  then  let  go  of  me,  turned  to  the  window 
and  looked  out.  I  could  see  by  the  heaving  of 
his  back  that  he  was  sobbing  heavily  and  hope- 
lessly. 

"  Soon  after  I  went  to  my  mother  and  put 
my  arms  round  her  neck.  She  sat  quite  still 
and  silent,  as  if  she  were  paralysed.  Her  hands 
were  still  folded  upon  the  table  and  her  eyes 
turned  to  my  father. 

"  Still  she  neither  moved  nor  spoke  when 
I  bent  over  her,  kissed  her  and  whispered : 
'  Good-bye,  mother  dear,  and  may  we  all  meet 
here  again  soon  ! ' 

"  I  stroked  her  hair  and  patted  her  hands. 
But  suddenly  she  collapsed.  Her  head  sank 
upon  the  table  and  she  moaned  in  broken  cries  : 
'  My  son,  my  boy — my  only  one !   .  .  .  ' 

"  My  father  hurried  to  her  side  and  bent  over 
her  while  he  kept  on  whispering  :  '  We  are  all 
in  God's  hands,  mother  dear  ;  we  are  all  in  God's 
hands.         . ' 

"  Then  he  said  calmly  to  me  :  '  The  horse  is 
put  in  now.  I  think  you  will  have  to  be  going, 
my  boy.' 

"  I  stood  in  the  middle  of  the  room  and  looked 
at  the  two,  and  for  the  first  time  in  my  Hfe  I 


28  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

understood  what  two  people  who  love  their  child 
can  be  made  to  suffer,  and  how  mercilessly 
grief  can  paralyse  both  their  words  and  their 
bodies. 

"  And  one  thing  more  :  how  little  it  all  meant 
to  ^e  compared  to  all  that  it  meant  to  them. 

"  I  could  lose  only  one  thing — my  life. 

"  They  could  lose  much,  very  much,  more. 
They  could  lose  that  which  meant  happiness  to 
them,  and  life,  and  the  future — that  which  was 
everything  to  them. 

"  My  father  slowly  raised  his  head  and  looked 
at  me. 

"  '  There  my  boy,  go  now,'  he  said  in  a  voice 
that  trembled  and  broke,  while  at  the  same  time 
he  sat  down  beside  my  mother  and  drew  her  to 
his  side.  *  We  two  will  fold  our  hands  and  trust 
and  hope  in  Him  who  permits  everything  to 
happen  according  to  His  will  and  for  our  good.' 

"  He  nodded  to  me.  I  stood  a  moment  hesi- 
tating. Then  I  went  slowly  out  of  the  room, 
looking  at  the  two  who  were  sitting  cheek  against 
cheek  as  I  closed  the  door,  and  quickly  I 
mounted  the  dogcart. 

"  I  saw  nothing  of  Marie.  I  reined  up  at  the 
magistrate's.  They  told  me  that  she  had 
collapsed  upon  the  floor  in  a  violent  fit  of  weep- 
ing when  she  came  back  that  morning.     They 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  29 

had  had  to  carry  her  upstairs  to  bed,  and  since 
then  she  had  had  no  control  of  herself.  She 
had  lain  moaning  and  weeping  and  had  spoken 
in  a  way  that  no  one  could  understand. 

"  I  heard  later  that  on  the  following  night 
they  had  had  to  send  for  a  doctor,  and  that  for 
many  days  they  feared  for  her  reason. 
•  •  •  •  • 

"  That  is  how  one  says  good-bye  when  one 
goes  away  to  the  war,"  he  said,  and  beat  his 
head.  *'  At  least  that  is  what  happ'ened  in  my 
case,  and  I  know  it  was  the  same  in  that  of 
many,  many  others. 

"  It  was  duty  that  called. 

"  But  the  rejoicings,  the  enthusiasm,  the 
flying  banners  and  the  martial  music  ! 

"  It  is  dreary  when  duty  calls  and  one's  heart 
is  cold.  I  was  made  to  feel  that  so  often  later 
on,  and  even  still  more  painfully  than  on  the 
day  when  I  said  good-bye  to  my  people  and 
my  home." 

Ill 

"  I  arrived  in  Berlin  late  in  the  evening, 
together  with  several  others  who  had  also  come 
by  train  from  my  part  of  the  country  and  from 
one  or  two  other  places  on  the  road. 


30  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  I  knew  Berlin  quite  well.  When  serving 
my  military  duty  I  spent  three  years  in  this 
cosmopolitan  city,  which  has  an  atmosphere 
of  provincial  pettishness  and  narrow-mindedness. 
It  is  the  strangest  mixture  of  power  and  industry, 
of  integrity  and  the  most  coarsened  vices. 
God-fearingness  and  bestiality  walk  side  by 
side ;  beauty  and  incomprehensible  lack  of 
taste  live  next  door  to  each  other.  A  city  in 
which  language  snaps  out  lashing  words  of 
command  and  of  overbearing  brutal  energy, 
or  lisps  in  decadent  rottenness. 

"  I  could  not  recognise  it  that  evening. 

"  There  had  been  joking  and  singing  in  the 
train.  '  Deutschland,  Deutschland  iiber  AUes, 
liber  AUes  in  der  Welt '  had  run  from  carriage 
to  carriage,  had  found  hearing  and  response 
in  one  and  had  glided  unnoticed  away  to  the 
next. 

"  We  were  not  all  equally  pleased,  of  course, 
with  the  prospect  before  us. 

"  I  recognised  the  tone,  however.  I  had  had 
an  experience  of  something  like  it  at  the 
manoeuvres.  Only  now  it  was  still  more  blatant, 
more  self-satisfied  and  self-glorifying  wherever 
it  could  find  a  vent. 

"  But  Berlin  !  It  was  something  quite  new 
that  evening.     It  was  like  a  world  by  itself 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  31 

hidden  away  under  an  immense  blue  dome 
filled  with  clamour. 

"  It  seemed  as  if  every  throat  tried  to  shout 
itself  hoarse,  as  if  it  were  a  question  as  to  who 
could  shout  the  loudest.  Everybody's  eyes 
shone.  Every  mouth  laughed  ;  at  last  the  great 
day  had  come  when  we  were  to  display  our  might 
and  power,  and  the  indomitable,  invincible 
strength  of  our  army. 

"  '  Long  live  the  Emperor  !  Long  Uve  the 
Army  ! '  they  shouted. 

"  Now  and  then,  as  if  the  longings  and  dreams 
in  every  one's  mind  had  found  clamorous 
utterance,  one  heard  the  shout,  '  To  Paris ! 
To  Paris  ! ' 

"  It  came  from  somewhere  or  other  in  the 
densely-massed  crowd  surging  through  the 
Friedrichsstrasse  and  filling  Unter  den  Linden 
from  the  Monument  of  Victory  up  to  the  Palace 
like  a  human  rampart  pressed  from  wall  to  wall. 
It  struck  like  lightning  in  the  nearest  mind,  it 
caught  like  fire  in  tow,  and  it  flashed  through 
the  multitude  like  an  electric  shock :  '  To 
Paris!  To  Paris!  Long  live  the  Emperor! 
Success  to  the  War  !  ' 

"  Then  it  died  away  far  off  in  a  faint  and 
lessening  murmur.  But  only  for  a  moment. 
The  surging  mood  of  the  hour  rose  again.    Some 


32  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

voices  began  to  sing  :  '  Deutschland,  Deutsch- 
land  liber  AUes,  iiber  AUes  in  der  Welt ' ;  and  at 
once  the  song  burst  forth  from  everyone's  lips 
while  faces  laughed  and  shone  with  enthusiasm, 
courage,  and  rampant  self-assurance. 

"  There  was  a  strength  and  grandeur  in  the 
sound  that  made  one  giddy.  It  was  like  the 
flames  of  a  sacred  fire  shooting  heavenwards 
and  turning  the  city  into  one  great,  beating 
heart,  into  one  single  mind,  filled  with  the  same 
burning  hope  and  the  same  ardent  longings. 

"  Rich  and  poor  were  there,  working-people 
and  grand  folks,  bright-eyed  and  modest  young 
women  and  painted  minxes  &i  the  street, 
^  souteneurs  '  and  street  arabs,  students  and  idle 
loungers,  people  from  offices,  factories  and 
shops — all  were  singing,  all  were  shouting, 
when  the  last  notes  of  the  song  came  back  to 
their  ears  like  a  faint  echo  from  far  away  : 
'  Long  live  the  Emperor  !  Long  live  Germany  ! 
Long  live  the  War ! ' 

"  I  understood  then  that  it  must  be  a  joy  to 
let  oneself  be  caught  up  by  this  omnipotent 
enthusiasm  ;  to  be  able  to  feel  in  one's  own  mind 
something  of  the  same  grandeur  and  glory, 
something  that  only  needed  setting  free  to 
become  ardent  zeal,  dauntless  will,  courage 
far  beyond  all  human  thought  and  reason. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  33 

"  At  the  same  time  I  felt  so  unutterably  poor 
as  I  walked  there  amongst  all  these  noisy  people, 
who  went  on  shouting  and  singing  as  if  a  world 
had  to  sink  into  ruins  under  the  breathing  of 
their  lungs. 

"  At  last  it  was  more  than  poverty  that  I 
felt.  It  was  a  painful  consciousness  that  I  had 
really  no  place  amongst  all  these  tumultuous 
and  rejoicing  people  who  shouted  and  went  on 
shouting  '  To  Paris  !  Long  live  the  Emperor  ! 
Long  live  the  Army !  Long  live  the  War ! ' 
just  because  this  very  desire,  *To  Paris,'  would 
be  the  realisation  of  all  their  desire,  their  hope 
and  their  hate.  * 

"  There  was  nothing  in  the  shouts  that 
kindled  any  ardour  in  me.  There  was  nothing 
in  all  that  happened  around  me  that  could  make 
my  heart  beat  with  joy  or  cause  the  blood  to 
course  quicker  in  my  veins.  I  was  as  a  stranger 
in  the  midst  of  it.  It  inspired  me  with  loathing 
at  last,  with  weariness  and  ill-will.  All  this 
roaring  and  yelhng  jarred  upon  my  ears. 

"  It  was  sheer  physical  pain  to  me,  all  this 
shouting  about  Paris  and  the  Emperor,  the  Army 
and  the  War. 

"It  was  all  something  in  which  I  had  no 
concern. 

"  I  had  never  learned  to  become  part  of  it 


34  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

that  was  beyond  me.  My  hopes  lay  in  another 
direction,  my  innermost  thoughts  too.  I  had 
no  love  whatever  for  all  that  these  people  about 
me  worshipped  as  their  own  life.  Nor  did  I 
curse  what  they  cursed.  Their  dreams  were  not 
my  dreams,  nor  their  hate  my  hate. 

"  I  felt  very  forsaken  and  lonely  as  I  walked 
back  to  the  barracks — so  inconsolably  deprived 
of  everything. 

"  All  the  others  possessed  the  hopes  and 
longings  of  a  great  period  in  history — something 
great  to  suffer  for,  something  great  to  die  for, 
with  a  bright  and  happy  smile  on  their  lips, 
and  a  glad  light  in  their  dying  eyes. 

"  They  were  ready,  all  of  them,  for  the  utmost 
sacrifice.    I  understood  that. 

"  I  had  only  one  thing  as  my  goal  to  guide 
me — duty.  Cold,  hard,  unalterable  duty, 
demanding  everything  of  me,  without  giving 
me  anything  whatever  in  return,  except  the 
pale  consciousness  that  I  had  done  what  I  ought 
because  I  had  to  ;  and  only  because  of  that. 

"  I  think  I  could  not  very  well  have  had  less. 

"  At  the  barracks  I  met  a  comrade  who  had 
been  next  to  me  in  the  ranks  during  the 
last  year  I  spent  as  a  soldier  in  Berlin.  It 
was  a  homely  and  comforting  pleasure  to  see 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  35 

him  again  after  the  lapse  of  four  years.  He  was 
always  such  a  decent  fellow,  rather  heavy  and 
usually  of  very  few  words,  but  I  knew  he  had  a 
heart  of  gold. 

"  He  told  me  about  his  home.  It  was  all  so 
touching  and  simple,  and  his  words  were  so 
quiet  and  gentle.  Apparently  there  were  no 
violent  emotions  in  his  mind. 

**  He  had  been  married  about  a  year  and  had 
been  living  on  a  small  half-neglected  farm  in 
Brandenburg.  He  told  me  about  the  farm,  the 
fields,  and  the  cattle.  It  all  sounded  very  beau- 
tiful. It  breathed  the  gentlest  and  tenderest 
love  for  the  soil  that  had  become  his.  I  under- 
stood that  every  acre,  every  little  hummock, 
every  blade  of  grass  had  a  happy  and  hidden 
place  in  his  heart. 

''  He  told  me,  too,  about  his  wife  and  the  little 
daughter  who  was  not  more  than  two  months 
old. 

"  '  My  little  wife  is  so  pretty,'  he  said  ;  and 
his  voice  took  such  a  warm  and  tender  tone. 
'  And  she  is  so  good.  She  was  so  cheerful  and 
brave  and  proud  when  I  had  to  go.  She  never 
cried  once  ;  she  only  told  me  to  be  brave  and 
strong  and  not  to  worry  about  anything  at 
home.  She  would  manage  everything  all  right 
until  I  came  back. 


36  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 


a  i. 


She  placed  our  little  girl  in  my  arms  and 
promised  me  that  she  would  take  care  of  her  and 
tell  her  about  her  father  who  was  away  at  the 
war  to  fight  for  the  rights  and  the  honour  of 
his  country. 

"  '  It  certainly  never  occurred  to  me  for  a 
moment  that  perhaps  I  might  never  again  see 
her  or  our  little  girl. 

" ' "  When  you  come  back  again,  soon,"  she 
kept  on  saying,  as  if  there  could  not  be  two 
opinions  about  that  matter. 

"  '  "  But  if  I  should  happen  to  stay  there  ?  " 
I  asked  her  once.  But  she  only  smiled  and 
kissed  me  and  said  that  she  knew  I  would  come 
back.  She  knew  for  quite  certain.  God  would 
not  have  the  heart  to  take  a  father  from  such  a 
dear  little  girl  and  her  mother.  She  had  already 
arranged  all  that  with  God.' 

"  My  dear  old  comrade  took  my  hand  in  a 
warm  and  hearty  grip.  There  was  a  trembhng 
anxiety  in  his  voice  as  he  said  to  me  : 

'' '  But  who  knows  what  will  happen  to  you 
and  me  ?  Perhaps  neither  of  us  will  ever  see 
our  homes  again.  They  all  say,  of  course,  that 
it  will  all  be  over  before  Christmas  ;  and  I 
suppose  it  will,  or  why  should  they  say  so  ? 
But  promise  me  one  thing.  If  I  am  killed, 
write  to  my  little  woman.    Tell  her  that  I  was 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  37 

a  good  comrade  and  a  brave  soldier,  and  that  I 
died  honourably  for  my  country. 

"  '  It  isn't  at  all  that  my  wife  needs  to  be 
told  ;  she  knows  all  that  quite  well.  But  I 
think  it  would  be  a  fine  thing  for  my  daughter 
to  read  something  like  that  about  her  father 
some  day  when  she  is  older  :  "  That  he  died 
honourably  for  his  country."  ' 

"  My  dear  man,  he  said  it  so  sincerely  and 
cordially,  this  plain  and  simple-minded  young 
Brandenburg  peasant.  It  seemed  to  send  a 
warm  thrill  through  my  mind.  It  was  clear  to 
me  that  the  words  came  from  the  depths  of 
his  soul ;  that  they  were  part  of  himself  and  gave 
him  rest  and  peace  of  mind  and  the  everlasting 
consolation  that  his  cause  was  just  and  great. 

"  I  understood  so  many  other  things  that 
night  and  the  following  day  as  we  marched  to  the 
railway  station,  to  proceed  to  the  Belgian  front. 

"  I  shall  never  forget  the  exultation  that 
hailed  us  as  we  marched  through  the  town, 
clad  in  new  substantial  uniforms. 

"  Bright  smiles  greeted  us  and  exciting  cheers. 
Flowers  rained  down  upon  us. 

"  It  was  a  brisk  and  smart  parade  march, 
accompanied  by  sweeping,  noisy  and  flourish- 
ing music.     We  were  the  hope  of  the  nation, 


38  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

and  its  heroes,  before  ever  we  had  fired  a 
shot. 

"They  believed  in  us.  They  trusted  in  us 
as  one  trusts  in  that  which  cannot  be  shaken. 
There  was  no- doubt  in  their  hearts.  They  had 
read  and  heard  so  often  that  we  were  unconquer- 
able. Young  women  waved  their  handkerchiefs 
to  us.  Old  men  and  young  waved  their  hats, 
and  cheering  roared  about  us.  Mothers  held 
their  babies  up  high,  so  that  they  might  get  a 
good  view  of  the  pride  of  the  nation  and  its 
victorious  power  setting  out  to  deeds  of  glory 
and  the  unfading  honour  of  heroes. 

"  And  as  the  train  carried  us  through  the 
radiant  summer  country,  flooded  in  sunshine 
and  golden  grain  wherever  we  turned,  the  rejoic- 
ings surged  around  us. 

"  Along  the  railway-line  children  and  grown-up 
people  stood  waving  flags  and  handkerchiefs. 
Blushing  young  ladies  with  bright,  enthusiastic 
eyes  gave  us  flowers  and  fruit  and  other  good 
things  at  the  stations  we  stopped  at. 

"  It  was  a  triumphal  progress — a  festival, 
a  splendid,  all-reconciling  glory. 

"  In  the  train  we  sang  all  the  songs  we  knew — 
'  Deutschland,  Deutschland  iiber  Alles,'  '  Wacht 
am  Rhein,'  '  Heil  dir  im  Siegerkranz,'  and  all 
those ;    and  running  from  carriage  to  carriage 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  39 

there  was  the  constantly  recurring  cry  that  had 
burned  in  the  hearts  of  all  and  expressed  the 
longings  and  hopes  of  years.    And  the  hate. 

"  '  To  Paris  1  To  Paris  !  Long  live  the  War  ! ' 
*  We  shall  be  there  in  a  month,  in  a  month  ! ' 
they  shouted.    '  In  a  month  !  in  a  month  ! ' 

"  And  the  laughter  was  loud  and  uproariously 
sure  of  victory. 

"  Sometimes  the  laughter  had  an  evil  ring 
in  it.  It  foreboded  death  and  seemed  not  to  be 
quite  human.  It  was  inspired  by  new  and  hot 
instincts — instincts  that  began  to  work  their 
way  to  the  surface  and  that  made  the  voices 
gruff  and  hoarse  and  kindled  in  the  eyes  a 
strangely  wild  and  burning  brightness. 

"  I  wondered  at  the  change  that  had  come 
over  my  old,  quiet  comrade  of  the  ranks.  His 
quietness  seemed  to  have  been  swept  away.  His 
eyes  glittered  too  ;  and  there  were  lines  about 
his  mouth  that  I  had  never  seen  there  before. 

"There  was  a  brutal,  lustful  laugh  on  it. 
Something  coarse  had  come  out  upon  it  that 
seemed  to  bring  out  the  animal  in  him  and 
stamp  it  upon  his  face. 

"  I  asked  him  once  how  he  thought  his  wife 
and  little  daughter  were  getting  on. 

"  He  looked  at  me  for  a  moment.  He  stared 
and  seemed  surprised.     It  seemed  to  me  that 


40  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

something  bright  and  tremblingly  tender  awoke 
in  his  eyes,  but  it  vanished  again  at  once. 

"  '  Long  live  the  Emperor  !  Success  to  the 
War  ! '  was  shouted  around  him. 

"  He  joined  in  the  shout  in  a  hoarse  and 
grating  voice,  and  as  he  struck  his  rifle  against 
the  floor,  he  went  on,  his  lips  seeming  to  tighten 
evilly  about  the  words, — 

" '  To  hell  with  the  French !— to  hell  with  them ! ' 

"  I  have  often  wondered  since  what  all 
these  young  men,  who  rejoiced  in  war  and 
seemed  so  assured  of  victory,  really  thought 
about  the  war  then.  I  am  inclined  to  beHeve 
that  they  did  not  think  at  all,  or,  at  any  rate, 
in  their  overweening  confidence,  they  thought 
the  whole  affair  would  be  ended  in  their  one  day 
meeting  a  few  Frenchmen  who  would  make 
tracks  for  Paris  as  soon  as  they  saw  them. 

"  And  that  would  be  the  end  of  that  war. 

"  The  whole  thing  was  only  to  last  about  a 
month  or  so.  Then  France  would  be  paralysed. 
It  was  really  only  a  matter  of  a  little  parade 
march  to  Paris.  That  was  what  was  commonly 
said,  and  probably  not  much  more  than  that  was 
thought  about  the  matter. 

"  It  is  hardly  likely  that  they  had  any  sus- 
picion of  what  war  was,  or  what  it  might  be 
expected  to  develop  into  :    hardly  more  than  I, 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  41 

at  any  rate  ;  and  to  me  war  was  something  vague 
and  indefinite. 

"  I  had  some  suspicion,  of  course,  that  houses 
might  be  burnt  down,  towns  laid  waste,  fields 
trampled  into  dust  and  human  beings  killed.  .  .  . 

''  But  what  I  imagined  then  was  only  child's 
play  compared  to  that  which  I  witnessed  later  ; 
and  I  am  convinced  that  if  any  of  us  had  dreamed 
what  this  war  was  to  demand  of  us  in  hardships 
and  sufferings,  of  tears  and  misery,  of  physical 
strength  and  superhuman  spiritual  endurance, 
we  would  assuredly  all  have  sat  in  silent  dread 
of  what  was  coming — in  spite  of  all  our  courage 
and  enthusiasm  and  ardent  patriotism. 

"  But  now  it  was  all  more  like  a  pleasure  trip  : 
at  any  rate,  something  that  was  chiefly  grand 
and  splendid,  something  offering  fine,  easily- 
won  victories  and  the  grateful  acclamations 
of  a  rejoicing  people — a  glorious  adventure, 
grand  and  splendid,  and  exciting  to  relate 
some  day  when  one  reached  home  again  and 
friends  flocked  round  one  and  listened  in  mute 
admiration. 

"  It  was  fortunate  for  us  that  we  took  it  all 
as  carelessly  as  we  did,  that  we  could  dismiss 
it  with  a  song  and  a  few  shouts  of  overweening 
self-confidence. 

"  I  say  '  we  '  for  I  joined  in  the  singing  and 


42  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

shouting  myself.  There  was  nothing  in  my  mind 
any  longer  that  made  any  resistance. 

"  You  see  I  was  amongst  so  many  good 
comrades,  and  I  fell  in  with  their  mood  without 
any  thought  or  reflection  about  anything.  I 
could  even  sometimes  feel  a  certain  satisfaction 
in  the  thought  that  I  was  taking  part  in  it — 
a  satisfaction  produced  and  maintained  by  that 
massed  suggestion  that  must  certainly  be  the 
fundamental  explanation  of  war  excitement. 

"  If  we  had  each  been  allowed  to  sit  and  nurse 
our  own  undisturbed  thoughts,  with  no  shouting, 
no  cheering,  no  flowers,  no  smiling  faces,  with 
none  of  all  that  whirling  excitement  that  dis- 
tracted our  minds  and  troubled  our  senses, 
there  would  hardly  have  been  much  left,  I  think, 
of  the  cheery  singing  and  self-confident  shouting. 

"  Then,  surely,  our  thoughts  would  have 
turned  to  those  to  whom  they  found  their  way 
in  the  beginning  in  the  case  of  my  old  comrade 
in  the  ranks — to  our  homes  and  to  all  those  dear 
people  who  were  undoubtedly  thinking  far  more 
deeply  and  seriously  of  what  we"  were  going  to 
than  we  were  ourselves. 

"  They  turned  in  that  direction,  at  any  rate, 
many  a  time  later,  when  we  had  a  lonely  watch, 
when  we  lay  tired  to  death  and  tortured  in 
soul  and  body  in  the  hell  of  the  trenches,  or 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  43 

when  we  lay  like  lumps  of  flesh  that  have  been 
thrown  to  one  side,  waiting  for  that  snatch  of 
sleep  which  we  did  not  get  after  all,  because 
the  events  of  the  day  tormented  our  minds  like 
diabolical  visions,  blood-stained  and  horror- 
filled  to  a  degree  that  words  cannot  express, 
because  our  language  is  far  too  bleached  and 
threadbare  for  the  description  of  visions  such 
as  no  one  can  conjure  up  even  with  the  wildest 
and  most  bestial  imagination." 


^  IV 

"  I  was  one  of  those  who  took  part  in  the 
storming  of  Liege. 

"  On  that  day  I  gained  for  the  first  time  some 
idea  of  what  a  horrible  thing  war  really  is, 
whether  one  is  fighting  for  one's  most  precious 
and  sacred  rights,  or  only  driven  on  because  one 
has  to  go. 

"  I  shall  never  forget  it.  It  is  graven  in  my 
mind  in  writing  that  can  never  be  worn  away. 
It  is  buried  there  with  so  much  else  that  hap- 
pened ;  and,  even  if  I  have  bright  and  good 
memories  of  happy  comradeship  and  the  gran- 
deur of  self-sacrifice  to  look  back  upon,  it  all 
pales  before  the  horrors  and  the  wearing  agony 


44  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

that  tear  into  the  soul  like  dirty  fists  in  an  open 
wound. 

"  I  took  part  in  the  rushing  of  the  barbed 
wire  defences,  instruments  of  torture  compared 
to  which  even  crucifixion  must  be  a  joy. 

"  We  began  at  once  in  the  morning  with  a 
violent  drumming  from  our  artillery.  Its  roar- 
ing was  terrible.  The  earth  rocked  beneath  us, 
as  if  the  solid  ground  were  giving  way.  The 
bombs  incessantly  dug  holes  in  the  earth  near 
the  enemy's  positions.  Hundreds  of  small 
white  shrapnel  clouds  hovered  in  the  air,  and 
hundreds  of  others  kept  on  coming  up. 

"  The  enemy's  artillery  replied.  The  thunder 
of  our  guns  blended  with  the  roaring  of  bombs 
and  shrapnel  falling  in  our  lines.  They  poured 
lead  over  us,  and  in  between  the  shrieking 
of  the  projectiles  ajjd  the  thunder  of  cannon 
we  heard  the  groaning  and  screaming  of  the 
wounded. 

"  ^  Fix  bayonets  ! '  was  the  order  that  rang 
out,  and  then  we  rushed  on  in  storming  columns. 
We  had  to  force  the  barbed  wire  hindrances. 
We  had  to,  cost  what  it  might. 

"  We  had  to  go  forward,  and  we  did. 

"  I  don't  understand  now  how  it  was  all 
done.  It  was  a  doom's-day  of  yelling  and 
screaming    and    shouts    of    command,    of    the 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  45 

growling  of  cannon  and  the  shrill  whistling  of 
shrapnel. 

"  My  comrades  fell  round  about  me,  but  I 
did  not  heed  them.  I  was  driven  on,  along  with 
the  others,  by  a  force  stronger  than  myself. 
I  plunged  on  blindly,  seeing  nothing  but  what 
happened  right  at  my  own  feet,  hardly  even 
that. 

"  Yes — I  remember  one  thing  :  the  first  sight 
that  burnt  itself  into  my  consciousness. 

"  I  saw  a  Belgian  soldier  standing  upright 
on  a  rampart  and  shooting  with  his  machine- 
gun  into  the  storming-lines,  rapidly  and  inces- 
santly. He  stuck  to  his  post  with  a  coolness 
that  despised  death.  He  did  not  give  up  until 
a  bayonet  thrust  put  an  end  to  his  life.  He  was 
a  hero  and  I  admired  him.  Even  in  death  his 
hand  tightly  held  his  machine-gun.  He  might 
have  saved  his  life  ;  he  might  have  sought 
cover  and  been  taken  prisoner  like  several 
others  that  day.  But  he  would  not.  To  the 
very  last  his  lips  curved  in  trembling  joy  every 
time  he  saw  how  he  had  made  a  clearing  where 
his  bullets  had  struck  home. 

"  He  had  only  one  thought,  if  indeed  he 
thought  at  all — '  I  shall  die  and  I  must  die,  but 
that  does  not  matter.  The  only  thing  of  the 
least  importance  here  is  to  take  as  many  as 


46  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

possible  of  the  others  with  me  into  eternity--^ 
kill,  kill,  kill !  ' 

"  And  so  we  rushed  on — still  on. 

"  It  seemed  to  me  once  that  the  thousands 
in  front  began  to  falter,  but  what  was  the  use  ? 
They  were  pushed  on  by  us  who  came  behind, 
and  behind  came  new  ranks  storming  on  and 
pushing  forward,  as  if  they  were  driven  on  by 
lashing  scourges  upon  a  naked  back. 

"  There  was  only  one  way — onward,  still  on. 

"  And  on  we  went. 

"  Sometimes  I  stumbled,  but  I  was  kept  on 
my  feet  by  those  in  front  and  those  behind.  I 
ran  as  if  on  slippery  lumps.  At  my  feet  lay 
corpse  by  corpse  with  open  mouth  and  staring 
eyes — bathed  in  pools  of  blood,  splashed  with 
gushed-out  brains,  or  rent  intestines — or  with 
torn  bodies. 

"  Still  we  rushed  on. 

"  I  tramped  away  on  what  happened  to  lie 
nearest.  I  put  the  heel  of  my  boot  in  a  glazing 
eye,  not  to  fall.  I  trampled  steaming  intestines, 
to  get  a  foothold  for  the  next  step. 

"  I  heard  groaning  at  my  feet — in  front, 
behind,  at  my  side.  I  saw  arms  stretched  up 
in  fervent  prayer  to  Heaven  for  mercy  on  the 
anguish  and  the  misery.  I  heard  young  men 
scream  '  Mother,  mother  !  '  in  the  death-lisp  of 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  47 

horror  and  dread.  I  saw  arms  catching  at 
arms,  and  comrades  lying  clinging  to  each  other, 
their  faces  pressed  to  the  ground  to  save  them- 
selves from  the  trampling  of  heavy  boots. 

"  To  save  themselves  !  Before  very  long 
they  would  be  trampled  into  blood  and  strings 
of  flesh  in  a  steaming,  sticky  mass  of  blood  and 
brains  that  would  splash  up  the  legs  of  those 
who  came  after  and  stain  them  as  would  the 
unheeded  mud  of  the  roads. 

"  Onwards  and  still  on  : 

"  Until  we  reached  the  barbed  wire. 

"  The  sight  was  appaUing — later  on.  At  the 
time  my  mind  only  grasped  the  picture  as  it 
took  shape  hastily  during  the  moment  of  our 
onward  rush. 

''  It  was  not  a  barbed-wire  defence  any  longer. 
It  was  a  steaming  rampart  of  human  bodies, 
torn  asunder  and  trampled  to  pieces.  Stumps  of 
arms  and  legs,  torn  throats  from  which  the 
blood  ran  in  a  clotted  stream.  Faces  torn  in 
cheeks  and  jaws  and  eyes.  And  a  shrieking  and 
death-ratthng,  a  wailing  and  moaning  that 
filled  my  ears  and  mingled  with  our  own  shrieks 
and  shouts  till  it  sounded  as  if  the  world  were 
coming  to  an  end  in  fear  and  terror. 

"  But  still  we  went  on. 

"  We  had  to  leap  over  the  barbed  wire,  while 


48  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

the  lead  screamed  about  us  and  man  after  man 
fell.  We  did  not  see  where  we  jumped  or  where 
we  trod.  We  trampled  on  that  wall  of  living  and 
dead,  of  ebbing  life  and  torn  bodies,  as  if  we 
trampled  on  hard,  resisting  lumps  of  earth.  Some 
were  caught  in  the  wire,  fell  with  a  shriek  and 
stretched  out  groping  hands  to  save  themselves. 
They  pulled  and  pulled,  while  the  points  dug 
deeper  and  deeper  into  their  flesh  and  tore  their 
clothes  and  limbs  to  rags. 

"  But  on — still  on — while  one's  chest  perspired 
and  one's  forehead  steamed  and  every  nerve 
trembled  as  if  it  would  snap. 

"  And  at  last  a  hand-to-hand  fight.  Chest 
against  chest — blows  with  rifle-butts — a  rending 
asunder  with  bayonets — a  tearing  to  pieces  of 
mouths  and  eyes  with  the  bare  fists  :  a  savage 
fury ;  an  unspeakable  bestiality — a  seething 
desire  to  murder  ;  and  at  the  same  time  an 
infinite,  all-pervading  rejoicing  every  time  a 
body  fell. 

"  I  remember  close  against  my  face  andther 
face  distorted  by  hate.  A  pair  of  blood-shot 
and  blazing  eyes  staring  into  my  own.  A  mouth 
grinning  like  a  death's  head.  Teeth  glittering 
sharp  and  white  between  open  blood-red  lips, 
like  those  of  a  wild  beast.  A  body  that  was  like 
a  closely  compressed  knot  of  strength  and  savage 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  49 

energy.  A  human  being — an  enemy — raging 
with  fury  and  hate  and  the  lust  of  vengeance, 
and  with  the  joy  of  being  able  to  slay  everyone 
that  came  near  him. 

"  I  saw  the  butt  of  a  rifle  raised  in  a  pair  of 
trembling  arms,  ready  to  hammer  my  forehead 
to  splinters  and  crush  the  life  out  of  me.  I 
heard  laughter  screaming  into  my  ears  and 
rending  my  very  soul,  as  though  it  tore  my 
nerves  into  rags. 

"  I  remember  jumping  aside  ;  and  a  foot 
crushing  into  a  face  of  ashen  paleness,  staring' 
up  at  me,  its  lips  awry,  like  a  drunken  man 
babbling  some  stupid  coarseness.  The  foot 
was  mine. 

"  I  remember  a  rifle-butt  whistling  through 
the  air  and  touching  my  arm.  .  .  . 

"  And  I  remember  how  I  suddenly  felt  as  if 
my  strength  increased  tenfold  and  as  if  my 
glance  distinguished  all  the  flickering  beams  of 
dust  in  the  blazing  sunshine  about  me.  The 
blood  raced  through  my  body  as  if  driven  on, 
quivering,  stamping  and  pressing  on  the  valves 
of  my  heart  till  they  smarted  and  ached.  There 
was  a  tug  at  my  muscles  as  if  they  were  tightly 
stretched  steel  springs-  that  suddenly  struck 
out  with  all  their  compressed  strength  because 
all  resistance  was  gone. 


so  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  A  stinging  pain  at  the  back  of  my  neck, 
as  if  my  brain  could  not  contain  all  that  suddenly 
rushed  through  its  intertwined  cords. 

"  And  then  a  forward  thrust  with  my  bayonet. 
I  saw  it  glitter  in  the  sun  in  a  rapid  flash  like  an 
electric  spark.  I  saw  it  plunge  into  a  throat 
and  a  jet  of  blood  springing  up  like  a  gurgling 
stream — hot  and  steaming.  .  .  . 

"  A  face  that  suddenly  paled  arid  fell  heavily 
with  a  shriek.  A  body  that  swayed  and  sank 
down. 

"  But  while  all  this  was  happening,  a  pair 
of  eyes  that  for  an  instant  burnt  into  mine  with 
a  glare  of  hate,  and  glowing  with  malice  and 
cursing  ;  and  two  lips  writhing  as  if  they  were 
shrieking  coarse  abuse  at  me,  as  they  whitened 
under  the  last  gasping  breath. 

"  Then  a  rattling  sound  tore  through  my 
nerves  like  a  blunt  knife — and  a  moment  after 
a  body  lay  like  a  lump  at  my  feet. 

"  It  was  a  fight  in  which  I  had  been  the  victor^ 
but  there  was  a  shout  :  forward  again  ;  fresh 
blows,  fresh  bayonet  thrusts — more  bodies 
falling  ;  a  steam  and  reek  of  death  and  corpses 
and  the  pouring  out  of  horrors  ;  a  chaos  of 
groaning  and  screaming  ;  insensate  murdering  ; 
shouting  and  shrieking,  cursing  and  yelling, 
moaning  and  gasping  in  the  throes  of  death  agony. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  51 

Man  against  man  in  unbridled,  insane  fury,  with 
but  one  hope,  one  wish,  one  trembling  desire — to 
murder  and  rend  and  rush  on  and  cut  down — 
only  murder,  murder,  murder.  ..." 

My  friend  groaned  as  if  the  effort  of  breathing 
caused  him  pain,  and  there  were  two  burning 
red  spots  on  his  cheeks.  He  closed  his  eyes 
and  pressed  his  hand  against  them,  while  his 
body  sank  still  deeper  into  the  chair  in  which  he 
sat. 

For  a  long  while  he  sat  silent.  I  could  see 
that  he  jerked  sometimes  in  sudden  starts. 
Then,  as  his  eyes  for  an  instant  caught  mine, 
he  said  :  "  No,  it  was  not  the  fairy-tale  of  our 
childhood.  But  I  am  quite  willing  to  admit 
that  at  the  time  it  was  going  on  I  felt  nothing 
against  it.  I  did  not  think,  I  only  slashed  on  ; 
and  every  time  I  saw  a  man  fall,  I  could  have 
laughed  aloud  and  kicked  him  in  contempt. 

"  I  dare  say  I  did,  too. 

"  After  all,  we  who  escaped  alive,  or  those 
who  died  at  once,  did  not  get  the  worst  of  it. 
But  all  the  wounded  lying  moaning  around  us, 
who  were  trampled  to  death  without  mercy 
or  pity  by  their  own  comrades — for  them  those 
moments  must  have  been  appalling  if  they  were 
conscious.  And  I  am  afraid  that  must  have  been 
the  case  with  many  of  them. 


52  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  My  own  experience  points  in  that  direction. 

"  Can  you  picture  to  yourself  the  horror  and 
suffering  those  poor  fellows  must  have  endured 
before  death  took  them  or  they  lost  conscious- 
ness ?  What  an  extreme  torture  it  must  have 
been  to  lie  there  helpless  and  forsaken,  feeling 
foot  after  foot  trampling  into  eyes  and  mouth, 
into  breast  and  stomach,  crushing  down  every 
inch  of  life,  while  the  agony  grew  and  the  mind 
was  tortured  by  the  most  frightful  blood- 
streaked  visions. 

"  There  is  really  no  standard  by  which  you 
can  measure  and  understand  what  it  is  that 
happens  when  an  attack  of  this  kind  has  to  be 
carried  on  to  its  completion,  regardless  of  cost, 
and  which  is  completed. 

''  There  was  plenty  of  human  material,  as  the 
phrase  goes. 

"  '  Human  material !  '  Have  you  ever  heard 
of  a  more  contemptuous  and  contemptible 
expression  to  use  of  the  living  and  thinking  beings 
who  are  driven  on  like  cattle,  mown  down, 
torn  asunder  or  maimed,  with  the  prospect 
of  dragging  on  wearily  through  a  long  life  of 
care  and  misery,  burdened  by  a  pity  that 
borders  on  contempt  ?  I  cannot  hear  it  without 
feeling  stung  with  indignation.  It  seems  a 
shameful  word  to  use  about  men  who  do  their 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  53 

duty  in  enthusiastic  joy  and  who  give  up  their 
lives  in  selfless  devotion  for  a  great  and  holy 
cause — and  that  is  what  spurs  them  on — in 
most  cases.  ..." 

He  paused  awhile,  then  went  on  : 

"  I  said  before  that  I  could  have  laughed 
aloud  in  the  midst  of  the  commotion.  I  could, 
and  I  certainly  did,  too.  There  was  sometimes 
a  strangely  compelling  excitement  about  it. 

"  But  afterwards — afterwards  ! 

"  I  remember  the  first  night,  when  we  got  a 
little  rest  after  the  attack.  We  lay  down  in  our 
clothes,  flung  amongst  some  heaps  of  straw 
like  flabby  bundles,  three  or  four  hundred  men. 

"  We  were  dead  tired,  yet  rest  was  unob- 
tainable. Some  laughed  and  some  shouted,  and 
arrogant  boasting  flew  from  mouth  to  mouth. 
It  was  all  so  new  still,  so  glorious.  They  had 
done  great  deeds,  worthy  of  heroes.  Later  on 
most  of  us  forgot  both  the  great  deeds  and  the 
glory. 

"  The  coarsest  and  most  brutal  boasting  of 
what  each  had  achieved  in  the  way  of  slaughter 
was  shouted  from  one  to  another.  There  was  a 
malicious  joy  in  the  words,  but  at  the  same  time 
there  was  a  glowing  pride,  speaking  of  weU- 
done  work,  of  satisfied  revenge,  of  justice 
fulfiUed. 


54  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  I  lay  a  long  while  listening  before  I  dosed 
off.  My  eyelids  were  as  heavy  as  lead  ;  my  body 
was  slack  and  ached  all  over  with  weariness. 
All  my  muscles  and  sinews  were  like  tender 
lumps.  My  brain  alone  did  not  cease  working, 
and  as  I  lay  there  dosing,  all  that  I  had  lived 
through  during  these  last  hours  glided  through 
my  thoughts  like  constantly-changing  visions. 

"  I  had  never  before  had  so  appalling  an 
experience  as  this.  I  have  seldom  lived  through 
anything  so  satiated  with  horror. 

"  I  saw  it  all  before  me  again — the  murdering, 
the  maimed  bodies,  the  distorted  faces,  the 
heaps  of  corpses  that  we  trampled  upon  to  make 
way  for  ourselves,  the  glazing  eyes,  the  smashed 
skulls,  the  steaming  intestines,  the  fragments 
of  bodies,  the  torn  throats,  all  these  were  only 
gathered  in  a  rapid  impression  the  first  time  I 
saw  them,  but  were  now  settled  into  a  fixed 
memory  which  I  slowly  lived  over  again  and 
dwelt  upon  in  all  its  details,  without  the  furious 
excitement  of  the  moment  and  its  unthinking, 
unfeeling  suspense. 

"  What  I  now  saw  was  only  cold,  naked 
realitv,  shorn  of  all  embellishments.  The  horror 
of  it  nearly  droVe  me  out  of  my  mind.  I  had  the 
sights  before  me  without  ceasing.  Sometimes 
it  seemed  to  me  as  if  I  could  smell  the  fumes  and 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  55 

reek  of  corpses  and  clotted  blood  and  crushed 
flesh  where  I  lay.  I  had  the  shouts  and  shrieks 
and  the  prayers  for  mercy  and  the  straining 
death-rattle  tearing  at  my  ears.  I  saw  dying 
eyes  staring  into  mine  with  all  the  appalling 
dread  of  torment  and  the  terror  of  death.  I 
saw  lips  twisted  in  hate  and  heard  thundering 
curses  rolling  through  all  the  ear-splitting 
roaring  and  clamour. 

"  I  groaned  in  horror.  I  felt  as  if  I  had  heavy 
stones  on  my  chest  — something  crushing  me  so 
that  I  gasped  for  air  ;  something  that  clutched 
at  my  throat  and  squeezed  it  so  that  I  felt  as 
if  I  must  lose  my  reason. 

"  I  possessed  nothing  whatever  that  might 
have  reconciled  me  to  all  this — nothing  to  tell 
me  that  I  ought  to  suffer  gladly  because  it  was 
for  something  great  and  good,  something  eternal 
and  holy.  There  was  nothing  at  all  to  shed  any 
redeeming  light  on  the  horror.  There  was  not 
even  the  excuse  of  hatred. 

"  I  had  only  murdered — murdered  until  I 
was  weary  ;  taken  the  lives  that  came  my  way  ; 
destroyed  as  many  human  beings  as  possible. 

"  But  why  ?  Who  will  give  me  the  answer 
to  that  '  why  '  ? 

"  They  were  not  my  enemies.  I  did  not  hate 
them ;     I    did   not   despise    them ;     I    had   no 


S6  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

revenge  to  gain  ;  I  had  not  to  administer  any 
retribution.  There  was  only  one  thing  that 
could  explain  my  conduct ;  only  one  reason 
could  be  given  to  justify  it. 

"  I  had  done  my  duty  ;  I  had  obeyed  orders 
and  done  my  best ;  I  had  acted  as  I  had  been 
compelled  by  the  force  of  circumstances  to  act. 

''  Of  course,  I  had  that  consoling  consciousness. 
But  I  had  had  to  pay  a  heavy  price  for  it — an 
appallingly  heavy  price. 

*'  I  had  to  pay  a  good  deal  more  yet  before 
my  accounts  were  squared." 


"  I  have  read  many  accounts  of  the  atrocities 
said  to  have  been  committed.  I  have  read  both 
our  own  reports  and  those  of  the  other  side. 
I  have  also  seen  that  they  have  been  denied, 
or  that  attempts  have  been  made  to  explain 
them  away  as  the  visions  of  diseased  brains, 
as  fiction,  or  as  the  efforts  of  untruthful  people 
to  make  themselves  interesting. 

''  Yes,  indeed  !    Would  it  were  so  ! 

"  But  even  if  there  are  fictions  and  false- 
hoods and  visionary  tales  amongst  them,  there  is 
plenty  of  truth  left.     And  I  do  not  understand 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  57 

how  anyone  can  believe  that  shameful  and 
revolting  things  have  not  been  committed — 
things  so  bestial,  so  coarse  and  horrible  in  all 
their  gruesomeness,  that  they  are  beyond  all 
description. 

"  Are  there  really  people  so  simple-minded 
as  to  believe,  or  capable  of  imagining,  that 
thousands  and  thousands  of  soldiers,  whose 
compassion  has  gradually  been  blunted,  or 
whose  animal  instincts  gradually  get  the  mastery 
of  them,  because  everything  is  placed  ready  in 
their  way — whose  contempt  for  human  life  and 
human  suffering  has  at  last  no  limit,  because, 
in  hunting  down  their  fellow  men  as  if  they  were 
unclean  animals  which  had  to  be  slaughtered, 
their  work  has  been  belauded  and  honoured  as 
their  greatest  and  highest  achievement — are 
there  really  people  so  simple  as  to  believe  that 
these  men  have  gone  through  all  this  without 
any  trace  or  effect  being  left  upon  their  fanati- 
cally excited  minds  ? 

"  Remember  what  sort  of  men  many  of  them 
were.  They  were  not  selected  as  you  would 
select  the  friends  you  wish  to  be  the  society 
of  your  wife  and  your  daughter  of  seventeen. 
There  were  bad  fellows  amongst  them,  many 
bad  fellows,  because  there  are  many  bad  people 
in  the  world.    And  there  are  far  more  of  them. 


58  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

and  far  worse,  when  instincts  are  allowed  free 
play.  Not  to  mention  what  happens  when  they 
are  directly  spurred  on — and  there  are  always 
plenty  of  ways  of  doing  that,  because  there 
is  always  plenty  of  coarseness  and  brutality. 

"  To  me  it  seems  to  be  so  very  plain.  It 
would  be  against  all  reason  and  common  sense 
to  deny  it. 

"  And,  anyhow,  denials  are  useless.  Facts 
speak  their  own  forcible  language. 

"  Just  imagine  what  it  would  be  if  all  the 
homeless,  hunted  and  insulted  people,  all  the 
violated  and  murdered  women,  all  the  ill-treated 
old  women  and  men,  all  the  murdered  children, 
if  all  these  could  stand  forth  and  give  evidence 
of  what  they  have  had  to  endure,  what  they  have 
had  to  see  and  to  suffer.  .  .  . 

"  It  would  be  appalling,  heartrending  misery. 

"  There  would  be  a  wailing,  a  groaning,  a 
shrieking,  and  a  cursing,  that  would  make 
humanity  stand  rigid  in  horror  at  what  man 
can  do  against  man,  coldly  and  heartlessly, 
often  with  a  happy  smile,  often  with  a  merry 
laugh. 

"  No,  it  is  a  good  thing  the  dead  are  silent. 
It  is  a  good  thing  it  is  only  paper  that  can  tell 
what  has  been  done.  It  is  a  good  thing  there  are 
no  words  appalling  and  misery-charged  enough 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  59 

to  describe  what  this  war  has  demanded  of 
suffering  and  injustice,  of  horror  and  boundless 
despair. 

"  I  am  afraid  the  world  would  become  a  mad- 
house if  we  could  hear  each  one  shriek  out  his 
or  her  anguish  and  horror,  or  see  what  each  had 
had  to  endure  of  tortures  and  overwhelming 
misery. 

"  No,  war  is  war.  And  humanity  and  war 
have  not  much  to  do  with  each  other.  After  a 
while  men  become  cruel,  as  war  is  cruel,  even 
the  best  of  them. 

"  Scrape  off  the  thin  varnish  of  culture  upon 
us  that  covers  the  animal  and  you  will  find  a 
creature  in  which  are  instincts  for  evil,  for  murder, 
for  theft,  for  rapine,  for  incendiarism  and 
torture,  for  all  that  in  times  of  peace  can  toler- 
ably well  be  kept  under  by  the  discipline  of  the 
law  and  the  watchful  supervision  of  the  com- 
munity— how  it  all  blazes  up  and  burns  with  an 
overmastering  power ! 

"  I  have  seen  so  much  of  all  this.  Many  a 
time  I  have  wept  in  horror  at  all  that  it  fell  to 
my  lot  to  see  and  hear. 

''  It  has  been  said  that  much  of  what  happened 
was  only  a  plain  and  just  retribution — a  neces- 
sary chastisement  ;  an  example  that  needed 
setting. 


6o  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  This  has  been  said,  and  not  least  frequently 
with  reference  to  Belgium.  It  has  been  asserted 
that  civilians  fired  upon  us,  both  openly  and 
from  behind  ambushes.  It  was  probably  true. 
But  was  that  so  strange  ?  Was  it  not  in  every 
way  perfectly  justifiable  ?  I  have  never  been 
able  to  understand  that  what  was  done  against 
Belgium  was  anything  but  a  gross  assault, 
nothing  else — a  violation  of  all  right  and  justice  ; 
a  crime  for  which  there  is  no  justification. 

"  I  have  been  told  that  it  has  been  justified 
from  the  point  of  view  of  absolutely  vital  interests. 

"  It  was  necessary.  It  was  the  only  resource 
for  the  attack  on  France — the  only  possible 
means  of  a  quick  attack  on  that  country. 

"  I  have,  however,  never  heard  anyone  dare  to 
assert  seriously  that  one  is  justified  in  murdering 
one  man  in  order  to  be  able  to  kill  his  neighbour. 
I  should  like  to  see  how  many  amongst  civilised 
people  would  support  that  view  in  everyday 
life  ;  and  has  the  State  a  greater  and  better 
right  ?  Does  a  crime  cease  to  be  a  crime  because 
the  State  commits  it  ?  I  think  not.  Altogether 
I  cannot  imagine  a  poorer  defence  of  what  was 
done  to  Belgium  than  this,  and  I  believe  that 
history  will  pass  a  sentence  that  knows  no 
lenience  on  the  guilty. 

"  Nor   do    I    see   why   there    should   be    any 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  6i 

lenience.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  nation  which 
has  perpetrated  this  deed  stands  self-condemned. 

'^  Was  it  so  strange,  then,  that  the  Belgian 
people  rose  against  us,  when  it  saw  how  we 
destroyed  the  country,  laid  waste  the  fields, 
blew  its  fairest  monuments  to  ruins,  tramped 
through  the  country  like  hordes  of  Huns, 
burned  down  houses  and  towns,  violated  women, 
ill-treated  old  men,  behaved  brutally  to  young 
people  and  children  ? 

"  Do  not  misunderstand  me.  We  are  not 
the  only  ones  who  have  committed  vile  deeds. 
But  we  have  certainlv  committed  the  most  and 
the  worst  because  we  have  had  the  greatest 
opportunity,  and  because  we  have  been  filled 
to  the  brim  with  a  brutal  and  self-confident 
pride,  and  that  contempt  for  aU  hindrances 
which  never  considers  the  means  if  only  the 
object  is  attained. 

*'  I  must  admit  that  I  have  learnt  to  admire 
this  people  which  defended  every  inch  of  country 
that  belonged  to  it  with  such  ardent  and  self- 
sacrificing  patriotism.  I  think  that  in  the 
way  they  have  fought  and  suffered  they  have 
been  grand  and  splendid  and  worthy  of  all  the 
honour  that  posterity  can  give  them  ;  and  I 
shall  never  grow  weary  of  acknowledging  that 
when   civilians   sometimes   took   their   share   in 


62  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

defending  the  country  they  only  did  what  was 
right. 

"  We  deserved  no  better,  considering  the  way 
in  which  we  marched  on. 

"  I  admire  this  nation  :  its  women,  its  men, 
its  youth.  I  admire  its  ardent  courage  and  its 
boundless  devotion.  I  admire  its  honest  and 
holy  hatred. 

"  I  remember  a  single  incident,  one  out  of 
many  others,  which  gave  me  the  firmest  assurance 
that  a  country  in  which  the  young  men  have 
such  a  sense  of  justice,  such  fortitude,  can  never 
decay. 

"  It  happened  during  our  march  on  Brussels. 
We  had  reached  one  of  those  beautiful,  idyllic 
little  towns  that  seemed  made  purposely  to 
contain  industrious,  good  and  happy  people. 

"  We  were  fired  upon  from  one  of  the  houses — 
anyhow,  so  it  was  positively  asserted  later.  I 
do  not  know  whether  there  was  any  truth  in  it 
or  not ;  at  any  rate,  I  am  not  sure  that  it  was 
true. 

"  There  was  always  a  dread  hanging  over  us 
wherever  we  went.  We  always  felt  uneasy — 
bad  consciences,  of  course.  Much  of  it  came, 
perhaps,  of  the  continual  assurance  that  these 
people  wanted  to  do  us  all  the  harm  they  could. 
It  was   said   that   the   vanguard   troops   which 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  63 

had  crossed  the  frontier  on  August  4th  had  been 
fired  upon  by  the  civiHan  population  ;  and  we 
received  orders  to  punish  the  civihans  without 
mercy  at  the  first  shot. 

"  We  were  in  constant  fear  of  attacks  by  free- 
lances ;  and  our  fear  was  increased  by  countless 
assertions  of  civilian  deeds  of  terror.  I  believe 
this  was  said  to  spur  our  hate  and  our  desire 
to  fight.  Anyhow,  I  saw  nothing  of  any  atro- 
cities committed  by  civilians. 

"  We  reached  the  village  early  in  the  after- 
noon and  scattered  over  the  neighbourhood 
while  we  waited  for  a  pontoon  bridge  to  be  put 
together. 

''  At  first  our  relations  with  the  townspeople 
were  very  peaceable.  They  gave  us  what  we 
asked  for  and  we  paid  honestly  for  what  we 
received. 

"  Meanwhile  the  bridge  had  been  finished. 
We  mustered  up  and  began  our  march  through 
the  town.  People  stood  at  the  windows  and  in 
the  doorways  and  looked  quietly  and  peaceably 
at  us. 

"  Then  it  was  that  a  shot  was  said  to  have  been 
fired  suddenly.  No  one  quite  knew  where  it 
came  from,  but  it  was  immediately  followed  by 
a  violent  rifle-fire  from  our  front  ranks.  Our 
vanguard  stopped,  the  ranks  got  into  disorder, 


64  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

and  panic  was  on  us  at  once.  We  fired  blindly. 
A  mitrailleuse  was  put  up  at  a  street  corner  and 
we  began  to  fire  at  the  houses.  One  gun  sent 
four  shells  over  the  town,  one  to  each  point  over 
the  compass. 

"  When  the  first  shot  was  fired  it  was  clear 
to  the  inhabitants  what  they  had  to  expect. 
Our  fame  had  preceded  us.  They  hid  in  cellars, 
jumped  over  walls  and  hedges,  and  fled  into  the 
country  to  seek  a  hiding-place.  Many  of  them 
who  would  not,  or  could  not,  escape  were  at 
once  shot  in  their  houses  where  we  found  them. 

"  And  then  began  the  sacking  and  plundering 
of  the  unfortunate  town.  Doors  and  windows 
were  smashed,  furniture  broken  to  bits,  and 
fires  made  with  benzine  in  various  places.  Many 
of  our  men  rushed  down  to  the  cellars,  where 
they  got  drunk.  They  assaulted  and  outraged 
the  women,  afterwards  murdering  them  if  they 
bewailed  their  lot.  They  clubbed  old  men  and 
young  with  hatchets,  ran  them  through  with 
their  bayonets  or  split  their  skulls  with  blows 
from  rifle-butts ;  fired  on  children  or  quite 
young  people  and  shouted  and  raged  like 
maniacs. 

"  We  behaved  like  vandals.  I  am  ashamed 
every  time  I  think  of  it.  I  burn  with  indignation 
when  I  remember  the  wailing  and  pleading  of 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  65 

these    unhappy    people,    their    boundless    grief, 
their  indescribable  helplessness  and  despair. 

"  In  the  midst  of  the  rioting  a  lieutenant  was 
shot. 

"  It  was  a  straight  and  well-aimed  bullet  that 
took  his  life,  and  there  was  no  doubt  whence 
it  came.  At  the  gable-end  of  one  of  the  houses 
that  were  still  spared  stood  a  lad  of  seventeen 
with  his  rifle,  calm  and  erect  as  one  who  knows 
he  has  a  perfect  right  to  do  what  he  has  done. 

*'  Four  men  were  ordered  to  seize  him.  I  was 
one  of  them.  But  when  he  saw  us  approaching 
he  disappeared  behind  the  house,  and  we  did 
not  find  him  till  we  had  climbed  to  the  loft  of 
a  building  behind.  He  had  barricaded  himself 
there  behind  some  barrels.  We  caught  a  glimpse 
of  the  rifle-barrel  pointed  at  us  as  we  came  up 
the  stairs,  and  we  could  see  his  eyes  like  two 
sharp  glints  in  the  semi-darkness. 

"  He  shot  one  of  us.  The  bullet  struck  home 
surely  enough.  The  man  who  was  hit  sank 
down  with  a  sigh,  and  we  could  hear  his  body 
fall  with  a  heavy  thud  against  the  floor  in  the 
passage  below. 

"  Then  he  came  out  with  the  gun  in  his  hand. 
He  had  sacrificed  his  last  cartridge. 

"  He  came  with  us  quietly.  He  did  not  say 
a  word.    His  lips  were  closed  in  a  thin  straight 


66  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

line  and  his  face  was  pale.  But  he  held  himself 
erect  and  walked  proudly  between  us  as  one  who 
has  no  thought  of  pleading  for  mercy.  He  was 
as  dauntless  as  one  who  knows  his  fate,  and  who 
has  made  it  what  he  wished  it  to  be. 

"  He  was  to  be  shot. 

"  When  he  was  placed  against  the  wall  of  the 
house  his  mother  came  running  up.  I  heard  later 
that  she  was  a  poor  widow  and  that  he  was 
her  only  son. 

"  She  screamed  in  terror,  and  her  face  was 
white  with  horror.  She  threw  herself  on  her 
knees  before  the  leader  of  the  company,  and, 
clinging  to  his  knees,  she  cried,  '  Don't  shoot 
him  !  He  has  done  nothing  wrong.  I  know 
it.    He  has  not  done  anything  wrong  !  ' 

"  It  was  a  mother  pleading  in  extreme  agony 
of  soul  for  her  child.  I  have  never  heard  a  voice 
so  charged  with  anguish.  I  have  never  seen 
a  form  so  twisted  in  despair. 

"  Still  clinging  to  the  leader's  knees  she  begged 
and  implored. 

"  '  He  is  my  only  child — my  only  one — my 
only  .  .  .  God  in  Heaven  !  spare  him  !  spare 
him  !    Take  me  instead  !    Take  me  !  ' 

"  She  still  lay  on  her  knees  with  her  face  to 
the  ground,  and  her  weeping  was  like  a  wild 
shrieking.     It  was  the  horror-choked  madness 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  67 

of  despair,  and  it  tore  through  my  mind  so  that 
it  nearly  made  me  ill,  and  I  felt  as  if  I  were  going 
to  faint. 

"  The  boy  still  stood  against  the  wall,  erect 
and  not  moving  a  muscle.  His  face  was  white 
and  his  eyes  burned  like  live  coals. 

"  Two  of  my  comrades  dragged  the  woman 
away,  but  she  went  on  screaming  : 

"  '  He  hasn't  done  anything  ;  he  hasn't  done 
anything  but  what  was  right  !  Oh,  you  hang- 
men !    You  murderers  !  ' 

^*  It  was  all  the  two  could  do  to  hold  her.  She 
struggled  to  free  herself.  Her  clothes  were  torn 
and  her  hair  hung  about  her  face  in  wild  disorder. 

"  The  order  rang  out :   '  Attention  !   Ready  ! ' 

"  I  laid  my  rifle  against  my  cheek.  I  felt  my 
arms  shaking,  and  it  was  almost  impossible  for 
me  to  keep  hold  of  my  gun.  It  weighed  like 
lead  in  my  hand. 

"  At  the  same  moment  that  the  order  was 
given  I  looked  at  the  boy. 

"  He  stood  immovably  erect  and  proud, 
not  a  muscle  in  his  body  trembled. 

''  But,  my  God  !  I  shall  never  forget  the 
look  that  met  us  from  his  eyes.  They  blazed 
with  hate.  They  were  the  very  picture  of  holy 
hatred,  ^those  two  glowing  pupils.  They  burnt 
into    my  innermost  soul.    They  sent  all  of  us  to 


68  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

hell  in  their  boundless  force  and  penetrating 
flame. 

"  '  Fire  !  ' 

"  I  closed  my  eyes  and  pulled  the  trigger. 
Where  my  bullet  went  I  don't  know.  I  believe 
it  went  into  the  air  or  down  into  the  ground. 
My  arm  shook  as  if  it  had  received  a  hard  and 
sudden  blow. 

"  I  don't  know  ;  but  I  hope,  in  any  case, 
that  I  had  no  share  in  causing  his  death. 

"  I  heard  a  crack  and  a  dull  thud,  and  when  I 
opened  my  eyes  again  the  boy  lay  prostrate 
on  the  ground.  At  the  same  moment  his  mother 
managed  to  free  herself.  The  two  soldiers  who 
had  held  her  tumbled  back.  The  next  instant 
she  lay  over  the  body  of  the  boy. 

"  She  flung  her  arms  about  his  neck  and  buried 
her  face  in  his  fair  hair. 

"  I  could  hear  her  moaning  : 

"  '  My  darling  boy — my  darling  !  Oh,  you 
murderers  !    You  murderers  ! ' 

"  Then  someone  kicked  her  and  another 
killed  her  with  a  bayonet  thrust  through  her 
back. 

"  Such  in  the  main  was  that  experience. 
"  One  might  perhaps  be  tempted  to  say  that, 
in  times  like  these,  the  death  of  a  youth  is  not 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  69 

of  very  much  consequence,  when  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  young  men  in  the  full  vigour  of 
health  have  to  suffer  death,  and  when  other 
hundreds  of  thousands  are  bereft  of  their  homes, 
their  future,  their  children,  their  fathers  or  bread- 
winners. 

"  I  admit  it.  He  was  only  a  boy  of  seventeen  ; 
and  what  is  a  boy  of  seventeen  amongst  hundreds 
of  thousands  ?  There  were  many  who  were  not 
even  so  mildly  treated  as  he,  or  had  so  easy  a 
death.  So  perhaps  he  is  not  more  to  be  pitied 
than  so  many  others ;  nor,  perhaps,  is  his 
mother. 

"  She  had  the  happiness — perhaps  the  greatest 
she  could  have — of  being  united  in  death  with 
her  boy. 

"  But  you  will  understand  how  such  an  inci- 
dent can  torment  one's  mind,  when  it  seems  that 
what  the  boy  did — from  an  average  human  point 
of  view — was  only  common  right  and  justice. 

''  Every  time  I  see  a  bright  and  plucky- 
looking  boy,  this  Belgian  boy's  fate  stands  out 
firmly  chiselled  in  my  consciousness.  I  live 
through  each  moment  of  that  time  ;  I  see  again 
that  white,  pale  face,  on  which  the  calm  was 
that  of  cold,  immovable  justice,  when  justice 
has  been  consummated. 

"  I  remember  that  in  that  little  Belgian  town 


70  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

there  was  a  boy,  a  brave  and  dauntless  boy, 
whom  the  war  had  transformed  into  a  hero  and 
the  protector  of  the  imperishable  rights  of  his 
home  and  country,  and  who  flung  his  burning 
hate  in  our  faces — a  hate  that  wished  us  all 
the  torments  of  life  and  death  and  eternity  in 
return  for  that  which  we  had  had  a  share  in 
doing. 

"  It  is  a  heavy  burden  to  bear,  a  heavy  hate 
to  have  dragging  upon  one  all  through  life. 

''  And  it  is  just  as  hard  and  heavy,  even  though 
I  could  not  act  otherwise,  because  duty  bade  me 
act  as  I  did. 

"  But  what  about  those  who  bear  the  original 
blame  ?     What  about  them  ?  " 


VI 

"  I  received  my  first  letter  from  home  when 
I  was  in  the  trenches  in  Flanders.  I  cannot  say 
that  I  had  been  longing  very  much  for  it.  The 
events  of  the  day  had  somehow  pushed  my 
home  into  the  background,  driven  it  into  an 
out-of-the-way  corner  of  my  mind,  and  my 
thoughts  rarely  strayed  thither. 

"  Everything  was  concentrated  mostly  on  the 
incidents  of  each  day  and  on  all  that  the  war  had 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  71 

taught  me.  These  thoughts  were  my  companions 
by  day,  and  they  were  with  me  in  my  dreams. 
They  filled  my  mind  to  its  innermost  recesses 
and  did  not  leave  room  for  much  else. 

"  Sometimes  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  had  no 
past — as  if  my  life  had  only  begun  on  the  day 
the  war  began. 

"  If  it  happened  now  and  then  that  my 
thoughts  tried  as  if  by  force  to  bring  joyful 
memories,  the  picture  of  home,  or  the  faces  of 
those  dear  to  me,  into  my  consciousness,  it  was 
at  once  thrust  aside  by  one  incident  or  another 
of  the  war,  and  always  by  something  that  tor- 
mented me  and  that  hurt.  It  torments  me  and 
hurts  this  very  day,  and  will  never  leave  me  until 
death  shuts  it  out  and  locks  the  door. 

"  Perhaps  there  is  a  kind  of  mercy  in  it. 
I  believe  it  was  fortunate  for  me  that  everything 
at  that  time  was  overshadowed  by  the  day  and 
the  moment.  If  my  thoughts  had  been  full  of 
longing  for  my  people  at  home  and  my  anxiety 
for  them,  I  don't  know  how  I  should  have 
endured  it  all. 

"  I  remember  that  I  looked  at  the  letter  with 
a  certain  start  of  wondering  curiosity,  a  sort  of 
uncomprehending  surprise  ;  but  only  until  I 
had  opened  the  letter  and  read  the  first  lines. 

"  '  My  own  dearest  friend,'  it  began. 


72  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  What  wonderfully  sweet  and  hushed  words ! 
What  a  world  of  gentleness  and  calm  did  they 
not  contain  !  What  a  strange  contrast  to  the 
hate  and  brutality  that  ever  since  the  storming 
of  Liege  had  overshadowed  everything  around 
me  every  single  hour  of  the  day  and  night  ! 

"  This  feeling  grew  stronger  as  I  read  the 
letter  through. 

"  I  suddenly  looked  into  a  quite  different 
world — a  world  which  I  had  all  but  quite 
forgotten  ;  a  language  of  sweetness  and  song, 
of  pure  and  beautiful  cadences.  As  I  read  it 
seemed  to  me  as  if  I  could  see  my  dear  old 
mother  sitting  in  the  twilight  and  hear  her 
singing  softly,  as  she  was  wont,  while  my 
fiancee  joined  in  and  my  father's  eyes  grew 
dim  with  longing  for  that  which  all  our  hearts 
desired. 

"  Suddenly  I  saw  the  fields  before  me  ;  the 
garden,  the  blue  fjord  ;  the  green  forests  and 
the  white  ribbon  of  the  road  with  its  border  of 
wide-crowned  poplars  that  gave  forth  a  strong, 
sweet  scent ;  the  old  farmhouses  with  their 
thatched  roofs  and  the  white  out-buildings 
shining  in  the  sun  ;  the  quiet,  gentle  and  homely 
people  and  the  merry,  chattering  children. 

"  I  saw  more  than  that,  much,  much  more. 
I  saw  everything  that  had  been  dear  to  me  and 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  73 

that  had  had  a  place  in  my  heart.  I  Hved  my 
childhood  over  again  and  my  youth.  I  searched 
out  all  those  hours  that  had  given  me  happiness, 
I  polished  up  all  those  memories  that  had  begun 
to  get  rusty.  I  was  far  away  at  last,  both  in 
time  and  in  space. 

"  My  dear  man,  I  was  at  home  ;  and  I  under- 
stood then,  to  the  very  root,  for  the  first  time  in 
my  life,  what  home  means,  and  what  a  marvel- 
lous, beautiful,  and  precious  gift  a  happy  home 
is. 

"  This  little  unpretentious  letter,  that  in 
words  did  not  tell  me  very  much  except  ordinary, 
everyday  incidents,  became  for  me  one  of  the 
most  beautiful  things  I  had  ever  known  :  the 
purest  joy  that  had  ever  made  my  heart  beat 
or  caused  my  eyes  to  grow  dim. 

"  I  hid  it  in  my  breast,  close  against  my 
skin.  For  many  a  long  day  it  was  my  refuge 
when  I  wanted  to  forget  the  present. 

"  I  also  kept  the  few  other  letters  that  reached 
me  whilst  I  was  away.  I  keep  them  still  as  a 
sacred  treasure.  They  are  both  black  and  frayed 
and  not  fit  for  fine  ladies'  fingers  to  touch, 
but  they  have  been  of  more  comfort  and  fuller 
joy  to  me  than  all  the  riches  of  the  world  could 
have  been. 

"  But  what  else  shall  I  tell  you  about  the 


74  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

time  that  I  spent  in  those  trenches  ?  Where 
shall  I  begin  and  where  shall  I  end  ?  It  was  all 
one  long  chain  of  privations  and  disgusting  inci- 
dents, and  an  unceasingly  wearing  strain,  that 
drove  many  of  my  comrades  mad,  and  that  wore 
my  body  and  my  nerves  with  a  mercilessness 
that  you  have  no  need  to  ask  me  about.  You 
have  only  to  look  at  me  to  know.  Do  I  now 
look  like  a  man  whom  life  has  handled  with 
velvet  gloves  ?  And  yet  I  think  that  I  set  out 
with  a  healthier  body  and  a  sounder  mind  than 
most. 

"  The  actual  everyday  life  there  was  not 
really  the  worst  part  of  what  one  had  to 
endure.  You  gradually  get  used  to  the  growth 
of  a  stubby  beard  on  your  face,  and  to  the  dirt 
caked  on  your  body.  You  can  get  used,  too, 
to  the  cold,  and  to  being  soaked  through  by 
the  rain  for  days,  and  having  to  wade  in  clayey 
mud  far  above  your  knees  from  morn  till  eve 
and  through  the  night  as  well ;  and  to  sleep 
at  night,  if  you  can,  while  the  lice  nibble  and 
the  rats  keep  you  company. 

"  In  a  way  these  things  are  trifles,  mere 
details. 

"  You  can  also  get  used  to  hardly  ever  seeing 
the  sun  in  those  narrow,  tortuous  ditches  and 
dens,  and  you  get  used  both  to  hunger  and  thirst 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  75 

when  necessary.  In  short,  you  quickly  get  used 
to  all  that  which  is,  after  all,  nothing  but  purely 
physical  discomfort. 

*'  No,  it  is  the  deadly  monotony  and  yet  the 
incessant  watchful  strain  ;  a  certain  paralysing 
inactivity  coupled  with  the  consciousness  that 
you  can  never  for  a  moment  feel  safe. 

"  That  was  what  sometimes  wore  one's  nerves 
to  rags. 

"  Bombardment  was  not  even  the  worst 
part  of  our  life.  You  quickly  get  used  to  that 
when  it  goes  no  further  than  the  ordinary,  daily 
kind.  Your  hearing  is  sharpened  to  an  incredible 
degree  of  acuteness.  You  learn  how  to  judge  of 
distance  and  direction  by  sound.  You  know  at 
last,  with  astonishing  accuracy,  where  a  shell 
will  burst  ;  and  if  now  and  then  one  carries  off 
a  few  of  your  comrades,  you  accept  it  as  quite 
a  commonplace  affair. 

"  After  a  time  human  life  came  to  be  regarded 
with  great  indifference.  I  had  seen  so  many  fall 
and  die,  that  death  no  longer  made  any  strong 
impression  upon  me.  It  had  become  a  matter 
of  course — something  included  in  the  routine 
of  the  day. 

"  But  life  in  the  trenches  demanded  watch- 
fulness, not  only  when  the  bombs  came  shrieking 
at  us,  or  aviators  circled  over  our  heads,  but 


76  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

also  when,  hour  after  hour,  our  eyes  peeping 
just  above  the  edge  of  the  trench  through  a 
slit  between  two  sandbags,  we  had  to  stand  and 
stare  into  the  night  on  the  look-out  for  those 
who  were  sometimes  lying  only  fifty  yards  away 
from  us. 

"  We  never  knew  when  they  would  suddenly 
attack  us.  We  never  had  either  rest  or  peace. 
Just  as  we  tried  to  get  a  little  rest  for  a  dead- 
tired  body  and  worn-out  nerves,  we  would  be 
called  out ;  and  then  to  pull  ourselves  together 
had  to  be  a  matter  of  seconds.  Weariness  and 
over-wrought  nerves  had  to  be  conquered  on  the 
instant.  We  had  to  keep  at  it  with  sound  senses 
and  all  our  muscles  strung  tight — for  hours, 
perhaps,  and  that,  too,  often  many  times  in  the 
course  of  twenty-four  hours. 

"  It  was  this  everlasting  uncertainty  and 
uneasiness  that  preyed  on  one's  mind  and  often 
made  the  happiest  and  most  cheerful  among 
us  silent — myself  not  least. 

"  The  others  had  at  least  something  to  buoy 
them  up. 

"  They  had  the  consciousness  that  they  were 
serving  a  cause  that  meant  future  and  father- 
land to  them.  They  faced  an  enemy.  They 
lived  and  suffered  for  an  idea  that  absorbed 
and  inspired  them. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  77 

''  I  lived  and  suffered  for  nothing  beyond 
the  fact  that  I  had  to  live  and  suffer  where  I 
was,  until  a  bullet  struck  me  some  day  ;  or  until 
I  was  worn  out  and  ripe  for  an  asylum  or  a 
hospital  like  so  many  of  the  others. 

"  I  was  the  silent  Dane — so  many  comrades 
said.  My  captain  said  so,  too.  I  was  the  only 
Dane  in  my  division.  There  had  been  five  of 
us,  but  the  others  were  long  since  gone.  Death 
took  three  of  them  as  early  as  Liege.  One  day 
a  bomb  found  out  the  fourth.  Nothing  was  left 
of  him  but  a  few  scraps  of  flesh  and  some  bits  of 
his  uniform. 

"  I  knew  that  I  was  liked  among  them.  Per- 
haps they  did  not  always  understand  my  silence. 
But  they  saw  that  on  every  occasion  I  had  done 
my  duty  to  the  utmost. 

"  I  even  earned  the  Iron  Cross  because  I 
rescued  a  little  subaltern — a  small,  jolly  and 
bright  nineteen-year-old  Berliner  ;  an  only  child  ; 
a  cheerful  and  enthusiastic  soul,  as  eager  as  a 
terrier. 

"  He  had  collapsed  under  a  bullet  wound  in 
his  thigh.  He  lay  about  twenty  yards  from  our 
trench,  and  would  certainly  have  bled  to  death 
if  I  had  not  crept  out  of  the  trench  and  crawled 
up  to  him  while  we  were  still  under  fire  from  the 
enemy'sjpositions. 


78  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

"  I  got  him  up  on  my  back,  his  arms  round 
my  neck,  and,  crawling  along  on  all  fours,  I 
managed  to  bring  him  safely  back  to  our  trench. 

"  Neither  he  nor  I  took  any  harm  on  the  way. 
A  bullet  struck  like  a  hammer  against  the  heel 
of  my  boot,  but  that  was  all  it  had  to  say  to 
me. 

'^My  comrades  cheered  and  greeted  me  with 
a  song.  They  sang  '  There  is  a  fair  land,'  not  the 
words,  for  they  did  not  know  them,  but  the 
tune.    They  knew  that  was  Danish. 

"  I  have  seldom  been  so  happy  as  I  was  then. 
When  the  Iron  Cross  was  given  to  me  and  my 
comrades  cheered  and  presented  arms,  it  seemed 
nothing  at  all  in  comparison  with  those  loved 
sounds,  in  the  tune  of  the  Danish  song,  that 
brought  the  tears  to  my  eyes  and  thrilled  me 
with  emotion. 

"  I  heard  later  that  the  little  lieutenant  had 
had  to  lose  his  leg.  But  his  life  was  saved,  and 
his  mother  sent  me  a  beautiful  letter  of  thanks. 

"  I  do  not  mention  this  as  a  piece  of  heroism. 
Do  not  misunderstand  me — I  do  not  wish  for 
any  glorification.  It  is  only  a  very  small  trifle 
amongst  thousands  of  incidents,  far  finer,  far 
nobler,  and  stamped  to  an  exalted  degree  with 
the  grandeur  of  self-sacrifice  and  contempt  of 
death. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  79 

"  I  only  mention  it  because  I  am  very  anxious 
that  you  should  understand  that  I  took  my  duty 
seriously,  and  that  I  strove  fairly  and  honestly 
to  serve  the  country  I  belong  to,  even  though 
it  does  not  possess  my  heart  and  never  can — 
now  less  than  ever,  by  the  way — and  even  though 
I  could  not  serve  it  with  the  ardent  and  self- 
effacing  devotion  of  patriotic  enthusiasm. 

"  What  then  was  the  worst  of  the  life  in  the 
trenches  ? 

"  Those  hours  were  the  worst  in  which  we 
tried  to  get  rest  and  could  not ;  or  when  we  lay 
dreaming,  or  saw  how  the  others  were  tormented 
by  nightmare. 

"  It  was  a  scene  that  was  repeated  time  after 
time,  and  it  was  always  equally  distressing  and 
gruesome,  because  most  of  us  knew  what  it  was 
to  suffer  those  torments. 

"  You  would  suddenly  see  two  comrades, 
who  had  up  till  then  been  sleeping  quietly  side 
by  side,  become  restless  and  begin  to  toss  about. 
Then  you  would  hear  some  abrupt  shouts,  that 
quickly  turned  into  hoarse  shrieks,  and  in  a 
short  time  you  would  see  them  roll  over  and 
fight  with  their  fists  at  each  other's  eyes,  or 
mouth  or  temples,  wherever  the  blow  might 
happen  to  fall.     You  would  see  them  seize  one 


8o  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

another  by  the  throat  in  a  passionate  strangling 
clutch,  and  hear  them  groaning  and  gasping 
until  at  last  you  succeeded  in  waking  and  parting 
them. 

"  The  last  was  often  a  difficult  matter.  Even 
in  a  semi-wakened  condition  they  often  con- 
tinued the  assaults  with  a  brutahty  and  rage 
for  which  a  peaceable  third  party  had  to  suffer 
when  intervening  to  prevent  them  from  doing 
each  other  a  serious  injury.  For  it  happened 
sometimes  that  a  man  was  choked  by  the  frenzied 
clutch  of  another  at  his  throat. 

"  In  their  dreams  they  would  imagine  that 
they  had  been  wounded  and  that  they  were  lying 
on  the  field,  waiting  for  the  ambulance.  Then 
suddenly  they  caught  sight  of  an  enemy  lying 
beside  them  and  staring  at  them.  His  eyes 
were  full  of  malice  and  hate,  and  they  could  see 
his  fingers,  in  spite  of  his  agony,  fumbling  for 
his  revolver.  Even  as  a  fellow-sufferer  on  the 
battlefield  he  could  not  control  his  hate.  There 
was  no  other  resource  then  but  to  throw  oneself 
upon  him  and  render  him  powerless  to  do  harm. 
If  one  of  the  two  had  to  lose  his  life,  it  had 
better  be  the  other  fellow. 

"  That,  in  its  bare  outline,  is  the  story  of  the 
dream.  It  was  terrible.  I  have  had  that  dream 
myself  and  have  often  been  in  its  grip,  and  every 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  8i 

time  I  have  panted  with  excitement  for  a  long 
time  after  and  felt  as  if  the  valves  of  my  heart 
were  going  to  burst,  and  as  if  stinging  blows 
were  being  struck  on  the  nape  of  my  neck. 

"  Now  imagine  having  this  dream,  this  horrible 
nightmare,  two  or  three  times,  perhaps,  in  the 
course  of  a  night,  and  you  will  understand  that 
we  were  always  in  a  state  of  uneasiness  and 
misgiving  when  seeking  sleep  and  rest,  and  that 
we  would  do  anything  to  keep  ourselves  awake 
rather  than  fall  into  the  horror  of  such  dreams. 

"  There  was  another  dream,  though,  that 
taunted  many  of  us  and  which  in  its  weirdness 
and  mercilessness  must  have  ruined  the  nerves 
of  many  for  the  rest  of  their  lives.  You  see,  when 
some  dream  vision  or  other  had  once  established 
itself  in  one's  consciousness  it  would  keep  on 
returning  night  after  night  for  a  long,  long  time  ; 
and  of  course  matters  were  not  improved  by 
our  telling  our  dreams  to  each  other.  They 
often  dominated  our  minds  even  when  awake 
with  a  violence  impossible  to  shake  off.  Besides, 
what  is  there  to  talk  about  in  a  trench  through 
the  long  night-watches  if  you  don't  talk  about 
the  very  things  that  haunt  you  more  than 
anything  else  that  happens  ? 

"  This  dream  was  something  like  this  : — 

"  You  would  imagine  that  you  suddenly  woke 


82  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

up  and  found  yourself  quite  alone  in  the 
trench.  Round  about  you  the  bombs  were 
working  their  work  of  destruction  and  your 
comrades  had  quietly  retired  to  a  safer 
position. 

"  Looking  out  across  the  country  through 
the  veil  of  a  grey  rain-clouded  night,  you  would 
see  the  bombs  ploughing  up  the  earth  and 
flinging  it  into  the  air  in  huge  smoking  columns. 
Their  crashing  tore  at  the  drums  of  your  ears. 
Suddenly  the  sharp  fan  of  a  searchlight  would 
cut  across  the  trench,  and  the  blood  vessels 
of  your  eyes  would  feel  as  if  they  were  bursting 
under  the  piercing  white  gleam.  In  its  glare 
you  would  see  the  mutilated  bodies  of  your 
comrades  about  you — fragments  of  limbs, 
smashed  skulls,  faces  distorted  by  terror  and  the 
throes  of  death. 

"  You  felt  overcome  with  the  eerieness  of  the 
solitude  and  darkness. 

"  You  grew  afraid  of  the  loneliness  and  the 
darkness  in  the  trenches  ;  for  it  is  only  the  know- 
ledge that  you  have  the  companionship  of  your 
comrades  that  enables  you  to  keep  up  your 
courage  at  any  time.  The  least  unfamiliar  sound 
makes  you  start,  and  your  body  stiffens  while 
perspiration  oozes  out  of  your  every  pore. 

"  It    sounds    childish,    perhaps,    but    a    rat 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  83 

rushing  in  between  your  legs  is  enough  to  bring 
out  the  beads  of  perspiration. 

"  Then  you  try  to  find  the  others.  You 
stare  for  a  moment  over  the  breastworks, 
but  you  see  only  the  grey  night  and  the 
flash  from  far  away  when  a  bomb  is  flung 
out. 

"  After  that  you  grope  your  way  through  the 
darkness  of  the  trench.  You  fall  full  length 
over  a  body  and  feel  your  way  about  you.  You 
get  your  hand  full  of  blood  from  burst  intestines, 
or  you  feel  the  sticky  mass  of  brains  gluing  your 
fingers  together  ;  or  your  hand  pushes  into  an 
open  mouth,  and  the  scraping  of  teeth  against 
your  skin  makes  your  blood  run  cold  through 
and  through. 

"  You  crawl  on — over  dead  bodies.  You 
perceive  the  acrid  smell  of  coagulated  blood 
and  the  exudations  of  death. 

"  At  last  you  are  on  the  level  ground  again. 
You  get  up  and  grope  on. 

"  But  in  a  little  while  the  same  thing  is 
repeated.  Again  you  fall — again  you  grope 
your  way  among  dead  bodies.  Now  and  then 
you  hear  a  groaning  and  a  pleading  for  water, 
or  you  feel  a  hand  fumbling  about  your  leg  or 
your  arm,  or  sliding  over  your  face.  You  jump 
up  and   run   away,   terror  tearing  at  all  your 


84  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

nerves  until  you  fall  again,  and  the  same  thing 
is  repeated  once  more. 

''  By  this  time  your  reason  is  almost  paralysed 
with  terror.  You  feel  every  pulse  hammering. 
You  could  scream — sometimes  you  do.  You 
tear  at  your  clothes  to  give  your  terror  some 
outlet  and  relief.  You  scratch  yourself  till  the 
blood  comes,  digging  your  nails  deep  in  your 
cheek  or  your  forehead.  You  hammer  at  your 
temples  to  drive  the  visions  away. 

"  Then  you  grope  your  way  round  a  turning. 

"  The  searchlight  suddenly  flashes  length- 
ways down  the  trench.  You  see  a  body 
supported  by  the  wall  of  the  trench,  standing 
upright  before  you.  The  glazed,  dead  eyes  are 
staring  at  you,  the  lips  grinning  in  the  rigidity 
of  death.  The  blood  is  trickling  from  a  wound 
in  the  temple  and  pours  down  the  pale  cheek, 
made  still  paler  by  the  cold  rays  of  the  search- 
light. 

"  It  grows  dark  again.  You  continue  groping 
— on,  still  further  on.  You  are  now  haunted  by 
fear  and  horror  to  the  verge  of  madness.  You 
feel  you  are  stumbling  over  corpses — heaps  of 
dead  and  mutilated  bodies.  You  are  tired  ;  your 
limbs  fail  you,  you  cannot  keep  up  any  longer, 
and  at  last  you  sink  down,  wearied  and  tortured 
to  death.      You  plunge  your   hands   up  to  the 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  85 

wrists  into  a  ripped-up  stomach  that  is  still 
warm.  You  scream  wildly  and  loudly — a  pierc- 
ing scream  that  seems  to  rend  your  throat.  .  .  . 

"  And  then  you  awake. 

"  But  you  do  not  wake  up  to  relief. 

"  All  the  wild  visions  continue  to  hammer  at 
your  mind.  Their  maddening  pictures  are  still 
in  your  consciousness,  and  every  time  you  are 
overpowered  by  weariness  you  glide  back  into 
the  terrors  of  the  dream. 

"  Then  comes  the  wearing  struggle  to  keep 
awake  and  give  your  thoughts  another  direction. 
But  it  is  nearly  always  impossible.  The  dream 
has  sunk  far  too  brutally  and  deeply  into  your 
mind.  You  live  through  it  with  your  eyes 
wide  open,  while  you  try  to  fix  your  glance 
upon  some  point  or  other  in  order  to  drive  it 
away,  but  you  very  seldom  succeed. 

"  Merciful  daylight  alone  brings  peace,  but 
at  the  same  time  it  brings  an  overwhelming, 
almost  unconquerable  exhaustion,  a  mental 
collapse,  a  nervous  system  so  worn  out  and 
tender  that  you  are  not  far  from  madness  or 
from  that  extreme  state  of  despair  that  leads 
to  suicide. 

"  That    is    the    horror    of    the    trenches — far 
more  terrible,  far  more  destructive,  than  fight 
ing,  or  bombs  or  mitrailleuses,  or  the  tense  and 


86  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

staring  watchfulness  of  the  long  hours  of  the 
night ;  far  worse  than  the  misery  of  the  muti- 
lations, the  screams  and  the  moans,  and  the 
panting  rattle  when  a  life  is  extinguished  by  a 
merciful  death." 


VII 


"  During  the  first  part  of  December  I  was  in 
a  trench  in  the  foremost  line  on  the  Russian 
front.  We  had  a  peaceful  time.  The  Russian 
attacks  were  neither  fierce  nor  frequent.  They 
amounted  mostly  to  small,  hurried  sorties  or 
encounters  between  outposts  or  patrols.  There 
were,  too,  only  very  few  of  those  sudden,  local, 
small  engagements  that  come  when  you  least 
expect  them,  and  which  as  a  rule  never  lead  to 
anything  but  a  few  men  on  either  side  being 
wounded  or  killed. 

"  And  yet  it  was  an  appalling  life,  during  the 
close  upon  three  weeks  that  I  was  there. 

"  It  was  rather  more  than  four  miles  to  the 
relief  company,  which  had  its  headquarters  in 
an  old  forester's  house,  long  since  deserted  by 
its  inmates,  and  of  which  only  a  roomy  barn 
was  fit  for  human  habitation.  Everything  else 
had  been  burnt  to  the  ground. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  87 

"  The  few  troops  stationed  there  for  relief 
duty  were  not  much  good.  They  were  worn 
out  with  hunger  and  cold. 

"  It  fell  at  last  to  our  lot  to  do  the  relief  duty. 

"  We  starved  and  froze,  tiU  at  last  we  were 
nearly  crazy  and  quite  indifferent  about  every- 
thing. 

"  Starvation  was  not  the  worst,  perhaps,  of 
what  we  had  to  endure.  You  can  get  used  to  a 
great  deal  in  that  direction.  I  have  had  to  live 
for  about  a  week  on  frozen  turnips  which  we 
thawed  at  a  wretched  little  trench  stove,  and 
I  had  nothing  to  drink  but  snow. 

"  It  was  all  right  during  the  first  three  or  four 
days.  We  even  found  it  rather  good  fun ; 
it  was  a  new  experience.  But  we  found  it 
hard  to  get  through  the  last  few  days.  And  yet 
it  was  child's  play  to  all  the  rest.  It  had  this 
redeeming  feature  about  it — it  gave  our  dreams 
a  quite  different  direction. 

"  We  dreamed  about  food. 

"  You  might  feel  tempted  to  laugh  at  these 
dreams,  in  which  one  saw  before  one  a  well- 
provided  table  and  smelt  the  pleasant  odour  of 
food,  striking  upon  one's  senses  like  a  provoking 
wave — one  simply  wallowed  in  a  state  of  happy 
comfort  and  content.  You  prepared  to  take 
your  place  at  this  gorgeous  table  ;  and  suddenly 


88  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

it  vanished  and  you  only  saw  a  gigantic  earth- 
grimy  turnip,  Hke  a  face  grinning  at  you  in 
mockery  and  scorn. 

"  Or  you  would  see  other  beautiful  sights, 
all  concerned  with  food,  but  they,  too,  always 
vanished  at  the  moment  of  realisation,  and  you 
would  wake  up  with  a  straining,  smarting  feeling 
in  your  diaphragm,  an  unbearable  thirst,  a  sensa- 
tion of  giddiness,  and  an  overpowering  weariness. 
"  But,  as  I  said  before,  hunger  is  not  the  worst 
thing.  You  get  over  that  when  you  are  healthy 
and  strong. 
"  But  the  cold !  .  .  . 

"  Try  to  imagine  these  ditches,  just  broad 
enough  for  two  men  to  squeeze  past  each  other, 
and  just  deep  enough  for  you  to  be  able  to  hide 
your  head  below  the  edge.  Then  try  to  imagine 
what  it  is  to  live  there  through  the  nights  and 
days  of  the  worst  part  of  a  Russian  winter, 
inactive,  and  yet  compelled  to  be  continually 
wakeful. 

"  There  was  no  protection  but  that  which 
one's  clothes  could  give  and  the  slight  shelter 
afforded  at  night  by  the  holes  dug  into  the  sides 
of  the  trench  and  lined  with  straw  that  gradually 
crumbled  into  dust. 

"  Sometimes  the  wind  swept  like  a  razor  along 
the  flat  bottom  of  the  trench,  and  the  frost  bit 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  89 

both  one's  hands  and  face.  At  last,  in  spite  of 
mittens,  one's  hands  were  like  torn  strips  of  meat. 
The  lobes  of  one's  ears  hung  in  rags,  the  lips  had 
deep  cracks. 

*'  One's  eyes,  however,  had  the  worst  of  it. 
They  suffered  terribly  from  the  glare  of  the 
snow  ;  and  not  least  at  night,  when  one  had  to 
stand  for  hours  staring  out  over  the  white  snow- 
cover  and  take  note  of  everything  that  might 
happen  both  far  and  near,  as  far  as  one's  sight 
could  possibly  reach. 

"  Sometimes  it  felt  as  if  the  apple  of  one's 
eye  were  scratched  with  sharp  needles.  The 
tears  blinded  and  smarted,  and  their  course 
over  one's  cheeks  made  one  feel  as  if  the  flesh 
were  being  torn  from  one's  face  in  long  strips 
right  to  the  very  bone. 

**  There  were  many  men  whose  sight  was 
destroyed  for  life  during  that  winter  in  Russia. 
Many  went  home  blind  from  those  trenches, 
broken,  despairing,  horror-stricken.  Three  men 
in  my  company  shot  themselves  in  the  horror 
of  blindness. 

"  It  was  not  always  the  optic  nerve,  however, 
that  was  destroyed.  Sometimes  blindness  was 
caused  by  a  paralysis  of  the  eyelids — a  paralysis 
which,  it  was  found  later,  could  sometimes  be 
cured  by  electric  treatment. 


90  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

"  And  then,  when  the  snow  began  to  fall ! 

"  It  would  come  sweeping  over  the  flat 
country  so  that  for  days  you  were  imprisoned 
in  a  world  of  whipping  and  whirling  white  and 
could  not  see  your  comrades  at  a  distance  of  a 
few  yards.  Hour  after  hour  you  had  to  stand 
with  your  back  against  it  and  let  it  sweep  and 
shriek  around  you,  while  the  wind  and  the  frost 
tore  your  flesh  into  strips.  Or  you  might  squat 
down  and  let  the  snow  cover  you  until  you 
collapsed,  and  you  had  suddenly  to  gather  up 
all  your  energy  and  rouse  yourself  if  you  did  not 
mean  to  sit  and  be  frozen  into  eternity. 

"  Nothing  is  so  terrible  as  cold  in  the  inactivity 
of  a  trench.  You  know  what  a  mental  and 
physical  discomfort  it  is,  and  how  dull  and 
apathetic  it  makes  you  feel  to  go  about  even  in 
a  slight  state  of  chilliness.  Imagine,  then,  living 
on  day  after  day,  without  respite,  feeling  as  if 
your  body  were  a  lump  of  solidly-frozen  meat, 
and  your  bones  aching  as  if  they  were  going  to 
crack. 

"  And  then  those  long,  long  nights  when  you 
tried  to  get  rest  and  warmth  and  neither  rest 
nor  warmth  was  to  be  had  ;  when  each  single 
limb  ached  as  if  your  whole  body  were  one 
single,  painful  boil ;  when  sores  and  cracks 
were  torn  and  rent,  and  you  could  not  make  an 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  91 

effort  to  move  because  the  cold  took  away  all 
your  strength  and  energy. 

"  Then  from  time  to  time  came  the  struggle  to 
keep  oneself  awake  in  spite  of  weariness  and 
hunger,  because  one  knew  only  too  well  that, 
once  under  the  dominion  of  sleep,  there  was  little 
probability  of  ever  waking  again.  Not  infre- 
quently, in  the  early  morning,  we  found  a  com- 
rade frozen  to  death  by  our  side,  wrapped  in 
the  oblivion  of  a  merciful  death.  Frostbites, 
too,  ^yhich  as  time  went  on  destroyed  one 
limb  or  another,  and  made  a  man  a  pitiable 
object  for  the  rest  of  his  life,  these  were  not 
unknown  during  that  winter  in  the  trenches  in 
Russia. 

"  Not  everyone  had  bodily  strength  or 
spiritual  energy  enough  to  keep  him  from  being 
overmastered  by  that  feeling  of  utter  apathy 
about  everything  which  was  the  road  to  death. 
For  there  lies  grave  danger.  There  comes  a  time 
when  men  feel  as  if  all  suffering  were  over,  all 
pains  gone  ;  moments  come  when  they  feel  all 
aglow  with  happiness  and  warmth  and  well- 
being,  and  when  the  fairest  sights  and  most 
vivid  colours  appear  before  their  eyes. 

"  But  it  is  in  such  moments  as  these  that  it 
becomes  absolutely  necessary  to  shake  off  the 
pleasant  impression   and   to  summon  all  one's 


92  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

powers  and  energy.  He  who  cannot  do  this, 
who  cannot  master  himself  enough  to  force  his 
mind  back  to  the  harsh  reaHty,  the  old  weariness 
and  pain,  must  inevitably  fall  a  prey  to  death. 

"  We  were  relieved  the  day  before  Christmas 
Eve,  and  as  far  as  I  was  concerned  it  was  high 
time.  I  was  almost  overcome  by  cold  and 
hunger.  My  eyes  could  no  longer  bear  the  painful 
glare  of  the  snow  and  the  long  nights  of  anxious 
gazing  over  the  shining  white  plains,  or  through 
the  bewildering  grey  of  the  snow  fog.  My  hands, 
too,  and  my  face  were  covered  with  sores. 
It  was  an  utterly  indescribable  joy  to  change  one's 
clothes,  and  to  get  rid  of  the  dirt  and  vermin. 
The  Hce  had  bitten  us  badly  ;  hair  and  scalp 
were  full  of  them.  It  was  glorious  to  cover  one's 
face  and  hands  with  vaseline,  so  thickly  that  it 
melted  off  in  greasy  drops.  And  oh!  the  joy  of 
getting  some  decent  food  again,  and  the  prospect 
of  sleeping  snugly  on  a  delightful  heap  of  straw, 
even  though  fully  dressed,  and  with  a  bundle  of 
thorn  branches  for  a  pillow!  .  .  .  One  learns 
to  appreciate  keenly  everything  that  concerns 
bodily  comfort.  One's  thoughts  are  occupied 
almost  entirely  with  food  and  sleep  ;  everything 
else  quickly  becomes  a  weariness.  Nothing 
outside  oneself  can  arouse  or  retain  any  interest. 
Everything  is  a  trifle  compared  to  the  question 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  93 

as  to  whether  there  will  be  a  chance  of  getting 
enough  to  eat  that  day,  or  whether  there  will 
be  a  chance  of  sleeping  heavily  through  the  hours 
like  some  weary  animal. 

^'  On  Christmas  Eve  the  Christmas  letters  and 
parcels  were  handed  round.  They  arrived  late 
in  the  evening  by  a  motor  car  from  the  nearest 
town,  which  was  over  nine  miles  away.  The 
car  had  made  a  laborious  journey  through  a 
bare  and  devastated  country,  where  the  roads 
were  deep  in  snow,  and  all  tracks  were  obscured, 
and  then  through  a  thick  wood,  gloomy  and 
wild,  so  torn  by  shells,  that  tree-tops  and  great 
trunks  lay  in  a  tangled  confusion  wherever  it 
had  to  pass. 

"  The  gifts  were  received  with  a  joy  that  moved 
the  men  to  tears.  We  were  as  happy  and  merry 
as  children,  and  the  happiest  of  all  were  those 
who  had  a  letter  from  home.  They  wandered  off 
into  the  solitude  of  the  forest,  each  going  his  own 
way,  and  we  did  not  see  them  again  for  hours. 

"  For  those  who  had  neither  a  letter  nor  any 
other  message  from  their  own  home  there  were 
gifts  from  total  strangers,  kind  souls  who  sent 
some  touching  little  word  of  greeting  as  well : 
'  To  our  brave  and  blessed  soldiers  in  the  grey  uni- 
forms ; '  .  .  .  'To  our  best  friends,  wishing  them 
a  happy  Christmas ;'...'  From  a  little  girl  to 


94  FORCED   TO   FIGHT 

one  of  the  heroes  of  the  Fatherland  ;'...*  From 
a  happy  mother ;'...'  From  a  mother  who 
has  no  one  left ;'...'  From  one  whose  dearest 
has  given  his  life  for  the  Fatherland.' 

"  Such  were  the  greetings.    And  the  gifts  were 
gifts  of  love. 

"  These  are  dull  words  when  one  reads  them 
in  print  in  a  newspaper.  They  sound  like 
affectation.  But  those  who  have  received  a  little 
gift  like  this  with  a  greeting  from  a  total  stranger, 
and  felt  the  love  which  prompted  it,  those  who 
have  seen  how  a  little  packet  of  tobacco,  a  few 
rolls  of  plug,  a  cake  of  chocolate,  a  pipe,  or 
whatever  the  little  thing  might  be,  can  gladden 
some  man's  existence  at  the  front,  and  suddenly 
bring  a  new  beauty  and  joy  into  life,  filling  it 
for  a  time  with  new  colour  and  new  meaning — 
those  understand  not  only  the  purity,  the  deep 
feeling,  and  the  tenderness  which  are  expressed 
by  such  gifts  of  love,  but  also  how  deeply  they 
sink  into  the  heart  of  the  man  who  receives 
them. 

"  I  have  seen  my  comrades  stand  and  gaze  at 
some  such  little  gift  and  greeting  as  if  they  held 
some  glorious  and  unexpected  treasure  in  their 
hands.  I  have  myself  experienced  that  delight- 
ful and  overwhelming  feeling.  It  is  an  almost 
indescribable  joy,  because  one's  first  and  fairest 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  95 

thought  is  an  overwhelming  rush  of  tender  and 
silent  gratitude  to  those  strangers  who  have  sent 
their  good  wishes  and  hopes  not  only  to  their 
own  nearest  and  dearest,  but  also  found  it  in 
their  hearts  and  minds  to  make  others  glad  as 
well.    I  have  seen  tall,  strong  men,  who  did  not 
easily  express  their  feelings  as  a  rule,  stand  and 
weep  with  some  such  little  gift  in  their  hands. 
I  have  seen  them,  by  stealth  or  openly,  press  it 
to  their  lips,  as  if  it  had  been  sent  to  them  by 
their  dearest  on  earth,  as  if  it  were  a  tender  and 
touching  message  from  one  heart  to  another.  .  .  . 
"  In  the  trenches  behind  the  front,  men  are  apt 
to  revert  to  the    primitive  condition  both  for 
good  and  evil.     All  their  feelings  come  to  the 
surface,  brutalities   and   sympathies  alike,  love, 
the  sense  of  unity,  the  passion  of  hatred.    They 
become    easy   to   understand   and   easy   to   see 
through.      There  are  few  who  can  keep  up  the 
disguises  of  civil  life.    Everyone  is  laid  open  and 
turned  inside  out  before  he  is  aware  of  it.     Early 
and  late,  every  man  sees  into  his  neighbour's 
innermost  soul,  laid  bare  to  his  gaze.     But  no 
one  is  surprised  at  his  neighbour's  soul,  and  no 
one  is  ashamed  of  his  own. 

"  The  noisy  and  overbearing  arrogance,  which 
was  noticeable  during  the  first  months  among 
those  who  had  been  in  the  war  from  its  beginning. 


96  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

gradually  disappeared,  giving  place  to  a  heavy 
and  weary  realisation  of  the  fact  that  no  one 
knew  when  all  this  horrible  business  would  end, 
or  indeed  what  the  end  of  it  would  be  ;  and  at 
the  same  time  we  all  became  more  and  more  like 
one  another.  Our  thoughts  and  feelings  were  all 
the  same.  As  soon  as  I  knew  what  I  felt  or 
thought  myself  under  any  given  circumstances 
I  also  knew  exactly  what  was  passing  in  the 
minds  of  the  others.  Thus  by  degrees  we  talked 
less  and  less  to  one  another,  and  often  avoided 
one  another,  each  seeking  privacy  for  himself. 
That  was  always  pleasanter  and  better  and 
happier  than  the  society  of  our  comrades,  which 
generally  resolved  itself  into  nothing  but  a  silent 
gazing  into  space. 

"  Now  and  then  there  was  a  little  music  to  en- 
liven us  in  the  trenches  or  at  the  front.  And 
naturally  there  were  here  and  there  merry 
natures,  who  could  make  the  others  smile  and 
laugh.  But  all  soon  froze  again,  and  turned  to 
bitterness  and  discomfort.  I  know  very  well 
that  quite  a  different  description  of  things  was 
given  in  many  of  the  letters  home.  I  have 
written  that  kind  of  letter  myself.  I  have  written 
descriptions  of  many  hours  spent  with  good  and 
cheerful  comrades  and  of  amusements,  of  con- 
tentment, and    that    the  whole    thing  was    not 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  97 

so  very  trying,  when  you  come  to  the  point, 
so  long  as  you  understood  how  to  adapt  yourself 
to  it. 

"Yes,  exactly;  pious  lies,  every  one  of  them. 
A  constant  stream  of  pious  lies  has  flowed  home- 
wards from  the  front  during  this  year  of  war, 
and  that,  too,  not  merely  on  account  of  the 
censor.  How  could  it  be  otherwise  ?  Who 
would  have  the  heart  to  make  those  at  home 
more  sad  and  anxious  than  they  were  already  ? 

"  No,  indeed.  So  it  was  best  to  describe  the 
whole  thing  in  cheerful  colours.  To  us  it  was 
all  the  same.  The  days  were  neither  better  nor 
worse  for  us.  But  perhaps  we  might  be  able  to 
give  those  at  home  a  few  brighter  hours,  and  help 
them  to  keep  up  their  courage.  And  was  not 
that  well  worth  a  handful  of  pious  lies  ? 

"  In  the  afternoon  we  decked  our  Christmas 
trees.  One  inside  the  barn  for  those  who  were 
too  much  exhausted  to  stir  ;  and  one  out  in  the 
snowy  forest  a  short  distance  from  the  keeper's 
hut.  People  had  sent  us  ornaments  and  little 
candles,  while  for  the  tree  itself  we  chose  a  little 
snow-sprinkled  pine — which  was  growing  alone 
in  an  open  space,  encircled  by  venerable  old 
trunks. 

"  It  stood  there,  as  if  it  had  been  expressly 
waiting  for  us  and  for  our  Christmas  Eve. 


98  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  As  the  darkness  came  on,  two  or  three 
hundred  men  gathered  round  the  tree.  Over  us 
was  a  clear,  starry  night  without  a  single  cloud 
to  mar  the  endless  depth  of  its  dark  blue.  Around 
us  stood  the  silent  forest,  pure  and  white,  with 
the  pale  moonbeams  showing  against  the  stems 
of  the  trees. 

"  It  was  a  delightful  and  an  absorbing  sight 
for  us  all — this  Christmas  tree  in  the  silent  forest, 
where  the  only  sound  to  be  heard  was  the 
creaking  of  our  footsteps  on  the  snow  ;  all  these 
various  colours  and  all  these  tiny  lights  amid  the 
white  painting  of  the  snow. 

"  It  made  us  all  quiet  and  silent.  It  led  at 
once  our  thoughts  and  hopes  far,  far  away — 
home  to  those  dear  rooms,  where  the  bright 
Christmas  tree  of  our  childhood  had  stood,  and 
where  our  Christmas  happiness  had  filled  every- 
one and  everything  with  joy  and  with  the  ten- 
derest  feelings  of  the  heart.  We  all  stood  with 
bent  head  :  there  were  no  words  heard,  nor  any 
exclamations  of  pleasure  ;  only  a  sound  as  of 
a  weary  sigh  was  breathed  through  the  silent 
air.  Or  perhaps  it  was  only  a  quiet  whisper 
among  the  old  branches.  A  stirring  of  the  night 
amid  its  winter's  dreams.  A  deep  and  profound 
seriousness  was  seen  on  every  face.  There  were 
lips  which  trembled.     There  were  hands  which 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  99 

were  laid  over  eyes  ;  there  were  hands  whch 
clasped  each  other  in  the  pressure  of  warm 
friendship,  or  in  the  silent  comradeship  of 
memory.  There  were  arms  that  found  their 
way  about  a  comrade's  neck. 

"  Then  our  captain  stepped  forward.  His 
head  was  bent,  and  his  eyes  were  fixed  upon  the 
snow  at  his  feet.  His  Ups  were  tightly  pressed 
together,  as  though  they  held  back  some  thought 
he  would  not  utter. 

"  Then  suddenly  he  straightened  himself  up 
and  looked  away  in  front  of  him  as  though  he 
saw  something  beautiful  far  away  in  the  sky. 

"  His  lips  quivered  as  he  asked  us  if  we  would 
sing  the  hymn,  '  Stille  Nacht,  heiUge  Nacht.' 

"  He  led  us  in  our  singing  ;  his  voice  sounded 
above  all  the  others.  It  was  so  clear  and  strong  : 
it  sounded  so  touching  and  so  sweet  with  the 
quiver  in  its  tones.  But  there  was  no  one  else 
who  sang  properly,  and  the  music  dwindled 
away  by  degrees.  At  last  it  was  only  an  indis- 
tinct humming.  Sometimes  it  sounded  as  if 
only  the  captain  were  singing,  and  at  last,  his 
voice  also  became  only  a  murmur. 

"  The  last  verse  melted  away  to  nothing. 

"  Then  he  spoke  a  few  words  to  us  about 
Christmas.  But  they  were  short.  He  began 
in   a   clear,  powerful  voice,  with   that   distinct 


100  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

utterance  which  a  soldier  acquires  from  years  of 
command.  But  it  soon  began  to  tremble,  and 
when  he  spoke  of  home  and  the  dear  ones  who 
at  that  very  moment  were  thinking  of  us  here, 
and  not  of  their  own  peaceful  Christmas,  he  was 
overcome  by  emotion.  He  bent  his  head  and 
pressed  his  hand  against  his  eyes  ;  his  words, 
when  he  began  the  prayer,  ^  Our  Father,  which 
art  in  Heaven,'  were  thick  with  tears  and 
passed  quickly  to  a  sobbing  '  Amen.' 

"  We  all  remained  standing  with  bent  heads. 
Here  and  there  could  be  heard  a  deep  sigh  or  a 
nervous  cough,  when  the  prayer  was  over.  There 
were  many  who  wept,  and  no  one  sought  to  hide 
his  feelings.  Why  should  he  ?'  All  our  thoughts 
were  going  the  same  way — to  home  and  to  all  the 
dear  ones,  whether  to  wife  and  child,  to  father 
and  mother,  to  whomsoever  it  was,  whose 
thoughts  in  that  moment  were  turned  towards 
us  in  hope  and  fear. 

"  Then  by  degrees  one  after  another  began  to 
go  away.  A  little  nod  to  a  comrade,  a  clasp  of 
the  hand,  a  last  look  at  the  lights  and  colours  of 
the  Christmas  Tree.  And  then  away  from  it 
all,  to  be  alone  with  one's  own  thoughts. 

'*  More  and  more  of  the  men  went  slowly 
away — some,  farther  into  the  forest  by  silent 
and  lonely  paths  ;  others,  out  upon  the  open  plain. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  loi 

"  I  was  one  of  the  last  to  go.  I  watched  the 
pale  gleam  of  the  little  candles  die  away  in  the 
night.  At  last  I  felt  the  loneliness  round  me 
like  a  torment.  But  nevertheless  I  could  not 
make  up  my  mind  to  be  with  the  others.  I  sought 
seclusion,  as  they  did.  I  found  it  at  the  edge  of 
the  forest  by  an  old  stone  dyke.  I  could  see  far 
over  the  flat  country,  white  with  snow  as  far  as 
the  eye  could  reach.  I  fancied  I  could  see  a  glow 
far  away,  of  something  burning,  hke  the  spark  of 
a  glowworm  by  the  edge  of  a  ditch  on  a  summer's 
night.  I  saw  the  beam  of  a  searchlight  pass 
over  the  first  line  trenches.  And  was  not  that 
the  flash  of  a  bomb,  that  blazed  up  and  dis- 
appeared again  ?  Even  on  the  holy  eve  of 
Christmas  the  horrors  of  war  were  still  there. 
I  turned  my  eyes  up  to  the  sky,  and  scanned  the 
vault  of  heaven  from  one  horizon  to  the  other. 
Far  to  the  northward,  over  my  home  by  the 
fjord,  there  was  the  same  vault  of  heaven,  the 

same  stars.    My  home I  closed  my  eyes  and 

saw  it  all  before  me.  The  Christmas  tree  on  the 
parlour  table — father  and  mother  each  sitting 
in  a  corner,  and  round  the  tree,  twenty  poor 
children  from  the  parish,  singing  and  dancing, 
as  our  custom  always  had  been,  right  on  from 
the  days  of  my  grandfather. 

"  I  heard  mother  sing  '  A  Child   is   born  in 


102  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

Bethlehem,'  in  her  sweet,  cheerful  voice,  which 
seemed  to  well  out  from  the  very  depths  of  her 
heart.  I  heard  father's  deep  bass  joining  in, 
and  I  saw  his  smile,  which  was  never  so  bright 
and  beautiful  as  on  that  evening,  when  he  could 
make  children  really  happy. 

"  I  felt  so  deeply,  overwhelmingly  distressed. 

"  Do  not  misunderstand  me  ;  this  distress  had 
nothing  to  do  with  myself,  or  with  my  position 
at  the  moment.  I  was  all  right.  I  wanted  for 
nothing  :  my  life  had  been  preserved.  I  could 
keep  Christmas  in  peace. 

"  There  was  nothing  amiss  with  me.  But  I 
was  distressed  nevertheless,  and  distressed  as  I 
have  seldom  been  over  anything.  I  felt  it  the 
whole  time  like  a  pain,  like  a  torment,  like 
something  that  could  make  me  weep  and  sob 
helplessly.  They  were  sitting  there  at  home  in 
the  old  farm  by  the  fjord,  on  the  holy,  peaceful 
eve  of  Christmas,  when  never  before  had  there 
been  anything  but  joy  and  gladness  for  them  ; 
but  now  their  hearts  were  full  of  anxiety  and 
anxious  questions  rose  to  their  lips.  What  could 
be  happening  to  me?  .  .  .  Was  I  still  alive ?  .  .  . 
Or  was  I  lying  dead  and  cold  in  the  trenches  or 
on  the  open  plain?  ...  Or  was  I  lying  wounded 
and  helpless  on  some  hospital  bed?  .  .  . 

"  Must  it  not  be  so  ?    Must  not  their  thoughts 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  103 

and  their  questions  be  such  as  these  ?  Such 
must  they  be  on  this  evening,  and  such  must 
they  have  been  every  day  and  every  hour  since 
I  left  my  home. 

"  But  they  could  get  no  answers  to  their 
questions.  They  could  not  get  to  know  anything, 
however  deeply  they  longed  and  prayed.  Not 
even  on  the  holy  eve  of  Christmas  could  they 
know  anything  about  the  son  whom  they  both 
loved  so  utterly,  and  who  had  been  the  joy  of 
their  lives,  not  least  on  every  Christmas  Eve, 
when  heart  meets  heart  so  readily  and  when  all 
human  goodness  and  lovingkindness  wells  forth 
from  its  pure  springs. 

"  Imagine  what  suffering  it  must  mean  to 
them,  sitting  there  with  thoughts  of  suspense  in 
their  hearts,  and  words  of  suspense  on  their  lips. 
I  hear  my  dear  old  mother  say  quietly,  '  God 
only  knows  how  it  is  with  our  boy  to-night, 
father.'  I  see  her  eyes  seek  my  father's.  I  see 
them  grow  dim.  I  see  my  father  get  up  and  go  to 
her  and  lay  his  arm  about  her  shoulders,  re- 
assuring her,  while  his  lips  tremble :  '  You  will 
see,  little  mother,  the  good  God  is  protecting  him.' 
{.  "  I  understand  how  sudden  terror  and  alarm 
fill  their  hearts.  How  they  tremble  with  emotion. 
How  the  bitter  thought  that  I  may  perhaps  be 
dead,  wears  them  out  and  tortures  them. 


104  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  They  are  both  thinking  of  it.  They  think  of  it 
so  much  that  they  almost  feel  they  know  it. 
But  neither  of  them  dares  express  the  thought 
for  fear  of  alarming  the  other.  And  so  by  degrees 
the  dread  of  it  grows  stronger  and  stronger  in 
their  minds.  It  fills  everything.  It  overcomes 
everything.  It  torments  them  and  wears  them 
out  with  its  horror.  But  nevertheless  they 
clasp  each  other's  hands,  in  a  beautiful  and  com- 
forting fashion,  while  they  whisper,  dreading  all 
the  while  that  it  may  be  otherwise :  ^  Yes,  yes, 
the  good  God  is  protecting  our  boy.' 

"  These  were  -my  thoughts  that  Christmas 
Eve  before  the  Russian  front.  I  believe  they 
were  true  thoughts.  Thus  must  things  have  been 
in  my  home,  and  in  many  others  besides. 

"  But  who  can  understand  the  painful  help- 
lessness, the  grief,  the  torment  that  fills  one's 
mind  when  one  has  come  at  last  to  realise  what 
those  at  home  must  be  suffering  every  moment 
and  every  hour  of  the  day,  because  they  know 
nothing — nothing  ? 

"  They  have  hope  to  support  them  and  prayer 
to  lean  upon  ?  Yes,  indeed.  No,  they  have 
nothing  at  all ;  for  neither  hope  nor  prayer  can 
give  them  sure  comfort  for  more  than  a  brief 
minute. 

"  No,   they  have   only  one   thing  left.     The 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  105 

most  terrible  of  all.    Suspense.    Terror.    Despair. 
Hopelessness. 

"  I  had  never  realised  it  all,  until  that  silent 
Christmas  Eve.  It  was  only  then  I  fully  under- 
stood what  a  terrible  existence  it  must  be  for 
those  at  home.  I  hardly  know,  but  it  seems  to 
me  that  this  is  one  of  the  saddest  things  which 
war  brings  in  its  train. 

"  It  is  almost  worse  than  the  nightmares  and 
the  hunger,  the  wounds,  the  groans  and  the 
misery  all  round  one. 

"  I  assure  you,  when  in  some  lonely  hour  one 
probes  that  feehng  to  its  depth  and  permits  it 
to  develop  to  its  full  extent  in  one's  imagination, 
it  wears  one  out  and  haunts  one  more  than 
most  things,  because  there  is  no  remedy  nor  help 
nor  comfort  for  it.  It  is  nothing  but  a  mighty, 
despairing,  all-overwhelming  sense  of  helpless- 
ness. It  can  torture.  It  can  bring  heartache.  It 
can  sometimes  trouble  a  man  till  he  loses  his 
reason. 

"  One  feels  sometimes  that  one  must  shout, 
until  one's  voice  cracks,  and  the  cry  is  heard  over 
the  whole  world  :  *  Yes, — I  am  alive,  you  dear 
ones,  alive — alive  !  '  " 


io6  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 


VIII 

"  On  the  East  front  I  took  part  in  the  great 
offensive  against  the  Russians.  My  old  comrade 
was  there  also  ;  he  was  still  alive.  But  there  were 
many  new  faces  in  my  division.  The  bloody  days 
before  Liege,  the  horrors  of  the  fight  through 
Belgium,  and  the  long  strife  in  the  trenches  of 
Flanders,  had  cost  many  men  their  lives  or  their 
reason. 

"  But  many  more  were  thinned  out,  before 
my  turn  came,  one  day  in  the  Argonne  in  the  early 
spring. 

"  I  remember  how  Belgium  was  laid  waste. 
But  to  tell  the  truth,  things  were  much  the  same 
in  East  Prussia.  Before  the  invasion,  it  was 
in  many  parts  a  melancholy  country.  But  it 
looked  more  pitiable  than  ever,  as  we  marched 
through  it,  with  the  Russians  retreating  before 
us.  Trampled  fields,  ploughed  up  by  shells, 
burnt  farms,  property  wantonly  injured  or 
destroyed,  towns  in  ruins  and  human  beings  in 
despair,  robbed  of  all  they  had,  their  happiness, 
their  joy,  their  future.  It  was  an  indescribable 
scene  of  misery  and  woe.  But  at  the  same 
time  it  was  exceedingly  touching  to  see  how  the 
greater    number    of    the    people    clung   to    the 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  107 

devastated  home,  whose  master  was  probably  in 
the  fighting  Kne,  if  he  were  not  already  killed. 
The  wretched  hovels  and  the  ruined  farms 
still  sheltered  human  creatures,  who  did  their 
work  as  best  they  could,  and  hid  themselves 
from  the  night  and  the  rain  in  some  cramped 
space,  between  half-charred  boards  and  ends 
of  beams,  or  whatever  they  could  find  to 
hand. 

"  It  was  misery.  It  was  poverty.  It  was 
wretchedness.  But  it  was  home — the  one  fixed 
point  in  their  existence.  If  they  once  forsook 
that,  they  were  exposed  to  the  merciless  uncer- 
tainty of  life.  So  they  clung  to  it  obstinately 
and  faithfully  in  spite  of  all  they  had  to  bear 
and  suffer,  both  when  the  Russians  advanced, 
and  when  they  retreated.  Among  their  other 
miseries  they  had  also  learnt  to  know  famine. 
When  the  Russians  advanced,  they  did  not 
leave  much  behind.  Many  a  time  these  people 
begged  our  last  slice  of  bread  from  us,  to  stay 
the  worst  of  their  hunger. 

"  We  gave  to  them  willingly.  I  felt  at  times, 
that  their  lot  was  far  worse  than  ours.  We 
indeed  might  lose  our  lives  in  many  different 
ways,  and  we  also  knew  what  it  was  to  be 
hungry.  But  we  had  not  to  listen  to  our  children 
crying  for  food,  or  see  our  tiny  infants  sicken 


io8  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

and  die  because    there  was  no   milk  to  be  had 
and  the  mother's  breasts  were  empty. 

"  I  can  well  understand  why  wherever  we 
came,  the  people  greeted  us  as  their  deliverers. 
"  I  understand  their  joy  and  their  often  bound- 
less gratitude  in  word  and  deed.  I  understand 
why  the  old  men  and  the  trembling  women 
so  often  fell  upon  our  necks  with  tears  of 
joy. 

"  It  must  be  heart-breaking  to  see  the  plot 
of  ground  you  love  laid  waste  and  trampled 
down,  without  being  able  to  do  anything  to  save 
it.  It  must  be  still  more  heart-breaking  to  see 
the  home  that  you  have  cherished  devoured  by 
flames,  and  then,  on  dark  and  stormy  nights, 
taking  your  children  by  the  hand  or  on  your 
back,  and  followed  by  terror-stricken  women  and 
bewildered  old  people,  to  flee  from  that  home 
and  wander  along  toilsome  roads  to  uncertainty, 
in  company  with  hundreds  of  others  who  know 
just  as  little  where  to  go  for  help  or  safety. 

"  We  met  many  such  crowds  of  homeless 
wayfarers  on  our  march,  people  who  could 
hardly  drag  themselves  along  for  hunger  and 
cold  and  terror. 

"  There  were  miserable  carts  drawn  by  miser- 
able, starved  horses  and  wretched  bits  of 
furniture,  piled  up  anyhow  in  haste  and  fear. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  109 

There  were  people  huddled  together  under  the 
lee  of  a  hedge  or  in  a  wood,  or  sheltering  in  the 
holes  they  had  dug  into  banks  of  earth  or  dykes, 
wrapped  in  rags,  starving  with  cold  and  still 
terror-stricken.  Men  gazing  towards  the  homes 
from  which  they  had  fled,  looking  in  bewilder- 
ment and  despair  at  the  downtrodden  and 
ruined  country  ;  women  lying  down  and  trying 
to  warm  their  little  ones  at  a  naked,  impoverished 
breast,  or  groaning  in  misery  and  hopelessness 
over  the  dying  eyes  of  a  child  ;  old  men  and  old 
women  with  only  one  wish  in  the  world — the  sum 
and  substance  of  their  prayers  from  hour  to 
hour  being  that  God  would  take  them  away  from 
all  this  misery,  which  they  could  not  in  the  least 
comprehend  and  which  they  had  not  strength 
enough  to  bear. 

"  And  what  appalling  things  they  told  us, 
in  trembling  voices  and  shaking  with  sobs  ! 

"  Not  only  their  homes,  their  domestic  animals 
and  their  furniture  had  been  harried  by  fire  and 
sword — it  cannot  be  otherwise  in  war,  I  suppose, 
for  it  has  no  mercy. 

"  It  had  been  here  as  it  had  been  in 
Belgium — the  soldiers  were  intoxicated  with 
savagery  and  the  lust  of  destruction.  In  such 
an  army  there  may  be  a  thousand  scoundrels 
amongst    a    hundred    thousand    decent    men  ; 


no  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

but  scoundrels  create  new  scoundrels,  drink 
begets  coarseness,  and  coarseness  begets  violence. 
Old  men  are  mocked  and  tortured,  women 
outraged  without  mercy,  and  innocent  little 
children  are  made  to  suffer  without  pity.  Men 
have  to  pay  for  their  hate  and  their  defiance, 
even  though  honest  and  justifiable,  with  military 
retribution,  merely  because  one  of  them  has  been 
imprudent.  He  has  stirred  up  and  set  ablaze 
passionate  instincts  that  no  one  can  quench. 

"  I  knew  what  might  happen — I  had  been 
through  the  whole  affair  in  Belgium.  I  knew 
from  experience  all  that  they  told  me,  and  a 
great  deal  more.  .  .  .  But  I  can  assure  you  now, 
and  I  shall  dare  to  say  it  on  the  day  I  have  to 
stand  before  my  Eternal  Judge,  I  have  never  of 
my  own  impulse  harmed  any  civiUan  ;  I  have 
no  murder  or  other  deed  of  shame  on  my 
conscience.  The  guilt  of  whatever  I  have  had 
a  share  in  doing  is  entirely  on  the  heads  of  those 
who  could  demand  it  of  me.  They  could  demand 
of  me  that  I  should  do  my  duty  and  whip  me 
into  doing  it,  or  shoot  me  if  I  refused.  I  had 
long  since  sworn  loyalty  to  the  colours.  That 
oath  is  sacred,  like  any  other  oath.  And  I  was 
a  subject  of  the  country  I  served  and  had  to 
serve. 

"  That  being  so,  may  I  not  be  allowed  to  say 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  in 

that  while  I  was  appalled  at  what  I  now  saw, 
I  was  at  the  same  time  filled  with  a  certain 
satisfaction.  It  appalled  me  because  all  horror 
appals,  yet  at  the  same  time  there  was  a  certain 
satisfaction  about  it,  because  I  saw  in  it  a  just 
retribution  for  all  that  we  had  done  in  Belgium — 
a  mild  and  very  lenient  retribution,  by  the  way. 
"  Don't  you  think  one  may  be  allowed  to 
say  that  without  being  stamped  as  cruel  and 
merciless  ? 

"  There  is,  amongst  my  Russian  experiences, 
an  incident  which  I  shall  always  be  glad  to 
cherish  with  the  warmest  gratitude,  because  it 
represents  to  me  what  we  mortals  usually  call 
Nemesis — ^that  is,  chastising  justice,  or  whatever 
name  you  prefer  to  give  it. 

"  I  call  it  the  judgment  of  God  because  it 
seemed  as  if  there  was  a  leading  and  guiding 
hand  in  it — a  hand  that  struck  one  who  was 
guilty  and  gave  atonement  for  two  whose  Uves 
had  been  taken. 

"  The  rearguard  to  which  I  belonged — I  think 
we  were  only  a  couple  of  thousand  men — had 
been  billeted  for  a '  day  in  a  fairly  large  village 
not  far  from  the  Russian  frontier.  It  was  one 
of  the  first  places  to  be  laid  waste.  There  were 
not  many  farms  or  houses  left  that  were  not  in 


112  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

ruins.  The  cattle  had  been  taken  and  the  corn 
trodden  down.  Many  homes  were  quite  deserted, 
and  no  one  knew  where  the  inmates  were. 
Besides,  who  could  know  at  such  a  time,  when 
each  one  had  enough  to  do  to  save  himself  and 
those  belonging  to  him.  Perhaps  they  were  dead  ; 
perhaps  terror  had  driven  them  to  madness  ; 
perhaps  they  had  dragged  themselves  along, 
weary  to  death,  in  the  train  of  the  fleeing  crowds 
and  had  fallen  by  the  wayside  in  a  ditch  or  at 
the  edge  of  a  forest,  left  behind  by  the  others 
who  continued  their  insensate  flight  and  took  heed 
of  naught  but  themselves  and  their  own  affairs. 

"  Perhaps  they  lay  by  the  roadside  gazing 
towards  the  home  that  was  now  a  ruin,  at  the 
fires  blazing  over  the  flat  country,  and  up  to  the 
heavens  where  it  seenied  to  them  that  every- 
thing was  forgotten — mercy,  goodness,  justice. 

"  Perhaps  they  murmured  a  prayer,  the  last, 
the  very  last,  and  then  lay  down  and  waited 
for  what  was  to  come — for  silent,  reconciling 
death,  that  would  bring  them  peace  and  allevia- 
tion for  all  that  they  had  not  been  able  to  endure 
in  a  world  that  seemed  to  them  to  have  been 
quite  forsaken  by  God. 

"  I  know  that  old  men  were  found  with  their 
hands  folded  on  their  breasts  and  the  reconciHng 
peace  of  death  on  their  wasted,  rigid  faces. 


FORCED  TO    FIGHT  113 

"  I  know  that  young  women  were  found  with 
their  infants  pressed  close  to  their  bare  breasts, 
as  if  trying  to  give  them  their  last  warmth,  until 
they  had  both  gone  into  the  land  of  everlasting 
peace,  slain  by  cold  and  hunger  and  terror. 

"  In  one  of  the  poorest  of  the  small  houses  in 
the  village  lived  a  young  woman.  She  had  been 
beautiful,  as  women  in  villages  often  are,  a 
radiant  figure  of  health  and  strength,  with  the 
perfume  and  sweetness  of  the  fields  and  their 
sunshine  on  her  lips  and  in  her  eyes.  She  seemed 
to  be  about  half-way  through  her  twenties. 
But  now  her  face  was  drawn  and  pale,  and  she 
dragged  herself  wearily  about  as  if  she  were  ill. 

"  I  remember  her  home  distinctly.  It  had 
been  a  little  six-windowed  thatched  house  near 
the  end  of  the  village.  Two  of  the  windows 
belonged  to  a  room  with  an  alcove  and  the 
kitchen.  The  other  part  of  the  house  had  been 
allotted  to  the  cow,  the  pigs,  and  the  hens. 

"  It  was  now  almost  in  ruins.  The  roof  was 
gone,  the  woodwork  charred,  and  the  walls  had 
tumbled  down  in  a  crumbling  heap  where  the 
animals  had  been.  Only  the  little  room  with  the 
alcove  and  the  kitchen  were  intact,  but  the 
window-panes  were  smashed,  the  door  battered 
in,  and  rags  had  been  stuck  in  here  and  there  as 
a  slight  protection  against  wind  and  weather. 


114  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  Behind  the  house  there  was  a  small,  down- 
trodden garden,  hedged  about  with  a  dyke  of 
willows  and  elders. 

"  On  the  day  when  the  Russians  entered  the 
village  they  ravaged  it  with  fire  and  sword  in 
their  savage  exultation.  It  was  said  that  many 
of  them  were  drunk.  However  that  may  have 
been,  they  forced  their  way  into  farmsteads  and 
houses,  took  what  there  was  of  cattle  and  fodder, 
smashed  everything  to  bits  here  and  set  on  fire 
there,  and  did  not  deal  gently  with  the  women 
in  the  houses. 

"  The  little  house  at  the  end  of  the  village  was 
also  visited  by  a  soldier.  He  stormed  and  raged 
and  shouted  and  spared  nothing  of  the  little 
that  could  be  spared.  Finally  he  threw  himself 
upon  the  young  wife  and  tried  to  take  her  by  force. 

"  Then  the  husband  rushed  upon  him  to  save 
his  wife's  honour.  He  did  not  succeed,  and  it 
cost  him  his  life.  He  fell  within  the  room, 
killed  by  the  blow  of  a  sword  on  his  head. 

"  The  soldier's  savagery  increased,  and  at  last 
it  completely  mastered  him.  He  kicked  the 
young  woman  till  she  was  nearly  beside  herself 
with  terror,  and  stabbed  her  little  boy,  who  was 
lying  in  the  bed,  with  a  bayonet  thrust. 

"  Then  only,  and  not  till  then,  was  he  satisfied 
with  his  achievements, 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  115 

"  The  poor  woman  buried  her  husband  and 
child  the  next  day  in  a  corner  of  the  garden  and 
covered  the  little  mound  with  flowers. 

"  There  was  no  one  who  could  have  helped  her 
to  give  them  Christian  burial.  It  then  became 
clear  to  everyone  that  she  had  lost  her  reason. 
She  went  about  muttering  continually,  with  a 
remote  and  strange  look  in  her  tear-worn  eyes, 
that  sometimes  looked  as  if  they  were  blind. 
She  would  often  sit  for  hours  on  the  garden  dyke 
beside  the  grave  of  her  husband  and  child. 

"  It  was  extremely  sad  and  pathetic,  and  heart- 
rending, to  see  her  sitting  there,  sometimes  till 
late  at  night,  as  if  she  were  waiting  for  the  two 
to  come  back. 

"  Sometimes  she  would  lie  down  on  the  grave, 
pressing  one  cheek  against  the  ground,  and  she 
would  lie  a  long  time  like  that — sometimes  until 
she  fell  asleep.  If  anyone  asked  her  why  she 
lay  there  she  stared  vacantly  with  a  pair  of 
bewildered,  tear-bright  eyes  and  answered 
through  her  sobs  that  she  could  hear  her  little 
boy  crying  and  calling  to  her. 

"  Every  time   a  convoy-  of  prisoners  passed 
through  the  village  she  was  seized  with  restless- 
ness.   She  was  eager  and  quick  in  her  movements 
and   she  stood    staring   intently   at    those   who 
passed  by. 


ii6  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  It  seemed  as  if  she  were  looking  for  one 
particular  face  amongst  the  many  hundreds, 
but  when  they  had  passed  by  she  collapsed  again 
and  dragged  herself  back  to  the  house,  or  out 
to  the  dyke  and  the  mound  in  the  corner  of  the 
garden. 

"  Towards  evening,  on  the  day  that  we  had 
entered  the  village,  I  was  standing  outside  her 
house  with  one  of  my  comrades.  She  was  going 
about  that  evening  moaning  as  she  had  never 
moaned  before.  Her  hair  was  hanging  in  matted 
strands  about  her  face,  and  her  clothes  were 
nothing  but  torn  rags.  It  seemed  as  if  she 
had  torn  them  in  her  horror. 

"  All  the  time  she  went  on  murmuring,  between 
her  moans  :  '  My  lovely  little  boy — my  lovely 
little  boy !  .  .  .  ' 

"  Now  and  then  she  clenched  one  hand  in 
the  other  or  struck  them  both  against  her  fore- 
head. 

"  While  we  were  standing  by  looking  at  her 
my  lieutenant  came  up.  He  tried  to  soothe  her 
and  patted  her  shoulder,  but  every  time  he 
touched  her  she  shuddered  and  seemed  to  shrink 
in  sudden  terror. 

'"' '  My  poor  little  boy  ! '  she  moaned.  '  They 
killed  him.  He  was  only  six  years  old  and  was 
lying  in  his  bed.     "  Pray  to  God,"  I  cried  to  him  ; 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  117 

''  pray  to  God."  I  was  lying  on  the  floor  by  his 
bed  and  saw  him  fold  his  hands  in  prayer,  while 
he  gazed  at  me  in  terror. 

"  '  But  he  who  was  standing  over  him  did  not 
spare  him.  He  stabbed  him  in  the  breast  with 
his  bayonet,  and  he  kicked  me  along  the  floor. 
My  husband  was  lying  murdered  on  the  door- 
step ;  his  face  was  red  with  blood  ;  his  forehead 
was  cut  open.' 

"  Her  words  came  in  rapid,  violent  gasps, 
while  she  pressed  her  hands  against  her  eyes 
as  if  to  shut  out  all  the  horror  she  saw  before 
her. 

"  *  But  there  is  justice  in  the  world,'  she 
screamed.  '  There  is  justice.  I  shall  find  him  ; 
I  shall  find  him  ;   I  shall  find  him  !  .  .  .  ' 

"  Then  she  grew  a  little  calmer,  and  the 
lieutenant  and  I  stood  whispering  to  each  other 
about  what  we  had  just  seen  and  about  what 
we  had  heard  about  her. 

"  Some  time  after  a  convoy  of  prisoners  passed 
by.    There  were  about  two  hundred  men. 

"  The  instant  the  young  woman  saw  the 
prisoners  she  rushed  out  on  the  road.  Meanwhile 
my  captain  had  come  up,  too.  He  stood  by  her 
side  and  closely  watched  her  movements.  She 
looked  Hke  an  animal  ready  to  spring.  Every 
muscle  was  tense,  every  nerve  tightened,  and 


ii8  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

meanwhile  her  eyes  scrutinised  the  prisoners  as 
they  passed  by. 

"  There  was  a  strange,  penetrating  force  in 
her  eyes.  They  burned  Uke  live  coals.  They 
flashed  like  rapiers. 

"  Suddenly  she  rushed  out  and  almost  threw 
herself  upon  one  of  the  prisoners  in  the  convoy. 
It  stopped,  and  as  she  clenched  her  hands 
threateningly  in  the  air  she  screamed  in  mingled 
exultation  and  agony  :  '  It's  he  !  It's  he  !  I 
knew  I  should  find  him  ! ' 

"  At  first  the  captive  soldier  stared  at  her  in 
surprise.  Suddenly  a  wave  of  deep  red  suffused 
his  face,  and  then  he  turned  ashy  grey  and  bent 
his  head.  It  looked  as  if  he  were  slowly  sinking 
on  his  knees. 

"  The  young  woman  went  on  crying  :  '  It's 
he  !    It's  he  !    I  knew  I  should  find  him  !  ' 

"  At  last  she  laughed  wildly,  a  laugh  that  was 
more  like  a  mad  shriek,  and  then  collapsed  on 
the  roadside  while  the  froth  oozed  through  her 
tightly-closed  lips." 

My  friend  ceased  speaking  for  a  moment,  and 
I  felt  a  prickling  and  tinghng  all  over  me.  It 
was  emotion  and  uneasiness  both  in  one. 

I  looked  at  him.  His  eyes  had  suddenly 
become  bright  and  clear,  and  there  was  a  smile 
about  his  narrow  lips  of  mingled  sadness  and  joy. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  119 

"  I  will  not  tell  you  anything  more  about  it," 
he  then  said.  "  I  will  not  go  further  into  what 
happened.  I  will  only  add  that  half  an  hour  later 
that  man  was  no  longer  among  the  living. 

"  We  shot  him, 

"  Was  it  honourable  and  just  ?  Is  it  never 
permissible  to  shoot  a  prisoner  ?  Perhaps — 
perhaps  not.  I  don't  wish  to  dispute  about  it 
with  anybody.  In  this  case  that  question  does 
not  interest  me  in  the  least.  I  don't  care  whether 
it  was  lawful  or  not. 

"  I  will  only  honestly  and  openly  declare  that 
to  me  this  little  incident  stands  out,  amongst  all 
the  appalling  things  I  saw,  as  something  infinitely 
beautiful  and  exalted. 

"  I  felt  that  at  that  moment  I  had  seen  cold, 
stern  Justice  face  to  face." 


IX 


"  Towards  the  spring  my  regiment  was  again 
sent  to  the  Western  front.  We  were  to  strengthen 
the  position  in  the  Argonne.  It  was  a  slow 
journey  from  east  to  west,  and  it  made  me  a 
good  deal  wiser  while  it  lasted. 

"  Above  all,  I  began  to  understand  fully 
that  my  comrades  were  growing  tired.     Their 


120  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

enthusiasm  and  their  fighting  ability  were  not 
lessened,  perhaps,  when  matters  were  really- 
serious  ;  neither,  perhaps,  had  their  hate  cooled. 
I  will  not  assert  anything,  one  way  or  the  other. 
But  their  overweening  self-assurance  was  broken. 

"  They  had  learned  to  look  soberly  at  things. 
They  understood  that  victory  was  still  a  long 
way  off — if,  indeed,  victory  were  ever  to  be  won. 
They  had  grown  silent  and  thoughtful. 

"  I  found  it  very  natural.  There  was  not 
much  to  talk  about,  and  there  was  nothing  what- 
ever on  the  journey  to  kindle  their  enthusiasm. 

"  There  was  nobody  along  the  railway  line 
to  cheer  us  or  wave  flags,  nor  was  there  anyone 
at  the  stations  to  give  us  flowers  or  fruit.  There 
was  no  rejoicing  anywhere. 

"  On  the  other  hand,  we  saw  many  women 
dressed  in  mourning,  and  there  was  an  atmosphere 
of  gloom  and  depression  about  every  place  we 
came  to.  The  day's  work  went  on  behind  a  veil 
of  mourning. 

"  The  boisterous  jubilations  and  the  boundless 
confidence  were  gone.  In  every  place  that  we 
arrived  at  everybody  and  everything  seemed  to 
bear  an  imprint  of  weariness  and  anxiety  as  to 
what  the  future  might  bring. 

"  We  noticed  it  not  least  in  the  various  places 
where  we  stopped,  where  officers  or  men  had  been 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  121 

home  on  furlough  and  who  were  now  returning 
to  the  front. 

"  There  was  no  joy  and  pride,  and  there  was 
no  faith  and  enthusiasm,  in  those  who  had  come 
to  see  them  off.  There  was  not  so  much  as  a 
flower. 

"  Instead  there  was  gloomy  apd  weary  grief. 
Most  of  the  women's  faces  were  pale  and  thin. 
The  eyes  had  that  washed-out  look  that  tells 
of  long  sleepless  nights,  and  of  days  crawling 
along  in  uncertainty  and  anxiety  from  hour  to 
hour.  On  the  children's  faces  there  was  uncon- 
cealed complaint  that  their  father  was  leaving 
them  again,  and  that  they  had  to  go  back  again 
to  the  slow,  dull  days,  in  which  they  never  saw 
their  mother's  smile  or  their  mother's  happiness, 
and  in  which  every  letter  from  the  father  they 
loved  only  gave  rise  to  new  anxiety  and  new 
uncertainty. 

"  And  what  of  that  parting  smile  that  some- 
times struggled  out  on  a  pale,  sad  face  ?  It 
was  a  smile  wrapped  in  despair  and  silent  com- 
plaint, and  charged  with  anxiety  and  troubled 
thoughts. 

"  In  the  last  hurried  embrace  and  in  the  last 
trembling  hand-clasp  there  was  a  sort  of  tacit 
mutual  consciousness  that  the  parting  was  for 
ever. 


122  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  There  were  more  tears  and  deeper  grief  than 
beside  an  open  grave  that  holds  one  whom  you 
have  loved  very  deeply. 

"  Many  women  fainted  when  the  train  began 
to  move  away.  The  little  courage  and  the  little 
mental  control  left  to  them  so  long  as  they 
could  hold  their  dear  one  in  their  arms  and  feel 
his  living  body  against  theirs  vanished  the 
moment  he  was  beyond  their  reach. 

"  It  was  mournful  to  see,  and  it  saddened  our 
thoughts.    Can  you  wonder  at  it  ? 

"  Many  of  us  remembered  the  clamorous 
and  ardent  exultations  when  we  first  set  out, 
the  cheering,  the  enthusiasm,  the  stirring 
shouts,  screaming  out  hate  and  assurance  of 
victory. 

"  And  now  this  contrast.  This  loud-voiced 
or  only  half-suppressed  despair.  These  faces 
that  spoke  of  grief,  of  sleeplessness,  of  care,  of 
the  scarcity  of  daily  bread,  even  of  hunger  some- 
times. All  this  silent  plaint  of  longing  that  never 
quite  found  a  voice,  of  hopes  so  often  dis- 
appointed, of  prayers  so  oft  unheard. 

"  I  could  see  the  impression  it  made  on  my 
comrades,  and  how  their  thoughts  were  with 
their  own  people  during  most  of  the  time. 

"  Many  were  the  lips  that  quivered  and  the 
eyes  that  were  dimmed.     Head  after  head  was 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  123 

silently  bent,  and  many  a   sigh  found  its  way- 
through  firmly-closed  lips. 

*'  Arrived  at  the  Argonne,  we  were  sent  out 
to  a  position  on  a  height.  There  was  only  a 
narrow,  marshy  slope  between  the  enemy's 
position  and  ours. 

"  We  were  ordered  out  in  the  evening  and 
spent  a  cold  and  foggy,  damp  night  in  some 
holes  dug  the  night  before.  Why  we  had  to  be 
there,  of  all  places,  none  of  us  understood.  The 
position  was  not  even  half  prepared. 

"  We  had  calculated  on  getting  away  the  next 
morning,  but  we  were  ordered  to  stay  there  the 
whole  day,  and  were  told  that  it  was  important 
that  the  hostile  observers,  especially  the  aviators, 
should  not  discover  the  position.  There  must  be 
no  putting  up  of  heads — still  less  of  the  upper 
part  of  the  body.  If  aviators  appeared  over  the 
position,  nobody  was  to  stir  an  inch. 

''  If,  at  that,  we  had  had  only  fairly  convenient 
holes  to  stay  in  !  But  they  were  narrow,  half  a 
yard  deep  at  the  most,  with  a  little  earth  in 
front.  You  could  neither  sit  nor  lie  down,  yet 
as  the  day  slowly  approached  you  tried  to  lie 
down,  first  one  way  and  then  another.  At  last 
you  had  to  make  the  best  of  your  lair,  such  as  it 
was.     One  man  had  doubled  his  knees  up  under 


124  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

his  chin ;  another  looked  like  a  broken  safety- 
match  ;  a  third  had  stretched  his  legs  straight 
out,  but  had  to  stoop  forward  to  keep  his  head 
from  being  seen.  And  there  was  nothing  to  lie 
down  on  or  sit  on  but  the  hard  damp  stone 
flooring,  and  our  overcoats  were  soaked  through 
by  the  night  mist.  Our  limbs  were  stiff  and 
cramped  after  lying  there  all  night.  We  shook 
with  cold — it  only  remained  for  the  enemy's 
artillery  to  begin  firing. 

"  And  at  about  nine  o'clock  in  the  morning 
it  did  begin. 

"  In  the  course  of  an  hour  they  had  fired  so  well 
into  our  position  that  they  evidently  knew  with 
astonishing  exactness  where  the  holes  were,  and 
they  sent  their  volleys  at  intervals  of  varying 
length.  First  one  to  the  right ;  then,  in  mad 
haste,  one  of  eight  rounds  to  the  left ;  then  one 
in  the  middle.  Up  and  down  the  row — backwards 
and  forwards — backwards  and  forwards. 

"  We  had  hardly  heard  the  shot  fired  ere 
the  projectile  struck  its  objective  with  a  terrific 
crash.  There  was  no  means  of  defending  oneself 
against  them.  They  came  tearing  on,  crafty, 
and  screaming,  and  sent  terror  through  all 
one's  quivering  nerves. 

"  It  gradually  strained  one's  mind  tp  madness 
to  sit  there  in  the  same  position  in   the   same 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  125 

miserable  little  hole,  while  all  one's  limbs  were 
aching  and  racked  with  pain. 

"  It  tore  at  the  threads  of  one's  nerves  to  sit 
there  and  wait  for  the  invisible  projectiles, 
whose  coming  one  did  not  suspect  until  they 
were  actually  in  one's  midst. 

"  Thoughts  almost  howled  through  one's  brain. 
The  shells  were  striking  the  left  wing  now — whose 
turn  would  it  be  next  ? — how  long  would  it  be 
before  the  next  volley  came  ? — there — now — no, 
it  went  somewhere  else — but  now — they  have 
come  this  way  again — you  can't  see  them  ; 
but  the  drums  of  your  ears  are  torn,  and  earth 
and  stones  fly  screaming  about  you.  You  crouch 
down,  cover  yourself,  shielding  yourself  with 
your  arms,  while  all  kinds  of  thoughts  chase 
each  other  through  your  mind. 

"  It's  over  again  now — but  next  time  you'll 
be  done  for — or  perhaps  not  yet — the  last  one 
struck  a  little  further  off — it's  a  miracle  though, 
that  you  are  still  alive  ;  but  you  mustn't  hope — 
mustn't  hope — the  day  is  long — who  knows 
whether  you  won't  have  to  stop  here  for  ever  ? 

*'Then  a  volley  strikes  again — roaring — 
thundering — the  earth  trembles  around  you. 
It  is  as  if  it  would  be  blown  into  atoms  and  flung 
into  the  ether  like  dust. 

**  Then  you  suddenly  shriek  in  terror :    *  No, 


126  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

no !  I  will  live  !  .  .  .  I  will  see  all  of  them  at 
home  again !  .  .  .  0  God,  0  God,  help  me  ! 
help  me  !  for  their  sakes — only  for  their  sakes  ! ' 
"  Perspiration  streams  from  every  pore.  One's 
sight  is  dizzied.  There  is  a  hammering  as  if 
with  a  mallet  at  the  back  of  one's  neck. 

"  Then  it  is  quiet  for  a  little  while,  half  an 
hour  perhaps.  But  the  day  is  long  ;  it  is  perhaps 
not  more  than  two  o'clock  yet.  You  fumble  for 
your  watch  ;  it  is  only  twelve  !  Perhaps  this 
hell  is  to  go  on  for  six  or  seven  hours  yet. 

"  Then  you  count  the  minutes.     '  One — two — 
three — four.'     How  endless  such  minutes   are  ! 
how  slowly,  how  terribly  slowly,  the  time  crawls . 
along  ! 

"  You  get  more  and  more  tired  of  sitting  in 
this  cramped  position.  One  limb  after  another 
feels  thick  and  swollen  and  painfully  tender. 
For  a  moment  you  try  to  straighten  yourself, 
but  then  the  volleys  begin  again. 

"  '  Ambulance  !  '  cries  some  one  in  terror  ; 
*  ambulance  !  '  ~ 

"  Then  there  is  a  sound  of  groaning  and  gur- 
gling that  runs  through  your  chest  like  the  stabs 
of  long  knives,  and  a  last  horrible,  rattling 
shriek,  ^  Ambulance  !  Help  me  1  Help  me  ! ' 

"  But  no  one  is  able  to  help,  not  even  the  man 
lying  only  three  paces  away. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  127 

"  Then  again  some  one  cries,  '  Ambulance  ! 
ambulance  !    Help  !  help  ! ' 

"  Three  or  four  men  pass  the  call  further  on 
along  the  line.  It  gives  comfort  for  a  moment, 
perhaps.    But  it  is  hopeless. 

"  Suddenly  three  shells  explode  simultaneously. 
Then  it  seemed  as  if  the  earth  opened  under  you 
and  all  its  banks  and  slopes  were  rushing  down 
in  a  rolling,  shattering,  crashing  chaos.  You 
cannot  see  anything,  neither  the  ground  nor  the 
sky,  for  earth  and  tree-roots  and  stones  are  rising 
amid  tremendous  columns  of  smoke  like  the 
mighty  outburst  of  a  volcano. 

"  And  now  the  earth  sinks  with  a  singing  hiss. 
A  little  way  off  I  see  two  men  buried  beneath 
the  debris.  Some  time  after  I  see  the  earth 
moving  a  little,  like  the  crust  of  the  ground  when 
a  mole  is  pushing  its  way  up.  Slowly  a  body 
appears.  The  face  is  streaming  with  blood.  The 
frightened  eyes  stare  helplessly  round.  The  hands 
grope  in  the  air  as  if  looking  for  support.  Then 
the  head  sinks,  face  downwards,  to  the  ground. 
I  hear  a  half-suflEocated  scream,  which  is  drowned 
in  the  crash  of  a  new  shell.    The  man  is  dead. 

"  The  other  one  remained  buried. 

"  It  goes  on  like  that  all  day  long.  Weariness, 
fear,  horror,  tear  at  one's  body  and  one's  nerves 
till  one  is  almost  out  of  one's  senses.    One's  body 


128  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

is  like  a  throbbing  and  suppurating  boil,  one's 
brain  like  a  continually-aching  lump.  One's 
eyes  water.  One's  heart  pumps  the  blood  out 
and  in  till  it  is  sore,  and  till  one  can  hardly 
breathe.  One's  throat  feels  as  if  it  were  torn  into 
strips.  A  hundred  times  in  the  day  one  has 
suffered  the  burning  agonies  of  the  fear  of  death. 

"  At  last  the  firing  stops.  Dusk  is  gradually 
beginning  to  fall.  Only  a  single  shell  still  finds 
its  way  to  us  and  reaps  its  harvest. 

"  You  get  up.  You  feel  as  if  your  limbs  had 
been  hammered  with  mallets.  At  first  you  find 
it  difiicult  to  stand  on  your  feet,  but  gradually 
the  blood  begins  to  circulate  again.  Some  men 
run  to  and  fro  in  front  of  the  holes  to  warm 
themselves  ;  others  seek  out  the  wounded.  The 
stretcher-bearers  have  plenty  of  work  to  do. 
One  by  one  they  take  the  wounded  away,  using 
the  brown  tent  canvas  as  stretchers. 

"  You  hear  a  quiet  moaning,  a  whimpering 
complaining.  Here  and  there  some  man  hobbles 
along  with  his  arms  round  the  necks  of  two 
comrades.  One  of  his  legs  is  only  a  stump,  or 
it  hangs  loose  and  drags  after  him. 

"  In  many  holes  you  still  find  a  silent,  huddled- 
up  form. 

"  '  Hullo,  comrade  ! '  you  call  to  him.  He 
does  not  move. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  129 

"  '  Are  you  asleep  ?    Anything  the  matter  ?  ' 

"  Still  no  answer. 

"  Then  you  kneel  down  to  shake  the  silent  one 
awake.  His  hand  is  wet  ;  his  forehead  red.  It 
is  blood.    He  is  dead. 

"  Over  there  sits  a  man  babbling  foolishly. 
His  hair  was  black  this  morning.  It  is  now  as 
white  as  snow.  He  sings  a  stupid  song,  spits 
now  and  then  like  a  baby  slobbering,  and  babbles 
again  and  makes  faces  as  if  he  were  mocking 
at  something.  Then  he  laughs,  brutally  and 
loudly.    He  has  gone  mad. 

"  The  day's  horrors  have  robbed  him  of  his 
reason. 

"  Two  of  his  comrades  go  to  him  and  pick  him 
up.  He  babbles  again  and  collapses  like  a  limp 
rag.  The  stretcher-bearers  arrive  and  take  him 
away. 

"  I  hear  his  babbling  and  brawling  further 
off,  and  see  him  strike  out  his  arms  as  if  he  had 
suddenly  been  seized  with  a  wild  and  uncon- 
trollable rage. 

"He  is  only  one  out  of  very,  very  many  who 
met  the  same  awful  fate  in  the  horrors  of  bom- 
bardment or  the  hell  of  the  trenches.  Their  fate 
is  worse  than  death. 

"  I  stand  looking  after  him  awhile.  Then  one 
of  my  comrades  comes  and  puts  his  arm  round 


130  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

my  shoulder.  He  shudders  as  if  with  cold,  and 
his  face  is  still  drawn  after  all  the  scenes  of 
horror. 

"  '  Better  two  years  in  gaol  than  another  day 
like  this,'  he  says. 

"  I  nod,  and  we  silently  press  each  other's 
hands. 

"  Then  we  are  ordered  to  form  up  and  march 
to  the  nearest  line  of  trenches. 

"  At  the  same  time  the  relief  for  the  night 
and  the  next  day  have  come  up,  and  while  the 
dead  are  being  carried  away  the  others  creep  into 
the  holes. 

"  They  see  what  awaits  them.  They  are  silent. 
•  •  •  •  • 

"  Night  brought  us  no  rest,  however.  A  couple 
of  hours  after  we  had  got  into  position  in  the 
trenches  the  enemy  began  to  storm  them. 

"  It  was  one  of  those  attacks  that  do  not  lead 
to  anything. 

"  It  began  by  shelling  the  holes,  but  that  did 
not  last  very  long.  Then  they  came  swarming 
from  the  other  side  of  the  marsh,  and  the  handful 
of  people  in  the  holes  were  no  use.  They  were 
knocked  over  and  cut  down  in  a  few  minutes. 

"  I  understood  less  than  ever  why  they  had 
to  be  there  at  all. 

"  Then  they  made  for  our  trench.    They  came 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  131 

straight  on  with  bayonets  fixed.  They  hurled 
hand-grenades  at  us.  The  earthworks  crashed 
and  tumbled  about  us  whilst  our  machine-guns 
ploughed  deep  into  their  ranks.  But  it  was  to  no 
purpose.  There  was  a  fury  about  their  attack 
that  nothing  could  stop.  They  ran  through  our 
barbed  wire  defences  as  if  they  had  been  made  of 
sewing-cotton.  Our  trenches  were  a  chaos  of 
earth  and  sand-bags  and  fragments  of  beams. 
You  could  neither  see  nor  hear.  The  whole  thing 
was  a  roaring,  clamorous,  simmering  confusion. 
The  air  resounded  with  half-choked  screams  and 
the  moans  of  the  dying,  with  shouts  and  yells 
and  oaths. 

"  Finally  we  went  for  each  other  with  bayonets 
— or  our  bare  fists.  I  chanced  to  see  one  of  my 
comrades  seized  by  the  throat  and  strangled, 
and  then  thrown  aside  Uke  a  carcass.  Another 
was  kicked  in  the  stomach,  and  fell  with  a  roar 
and  a  catching  gasp. 

"  Then  we  fled  in  mad  flight.  None  of 
us  stopped  to  think.  We  only  wanted  to  seek 
cover — only  cover  again.  We  stumbled  over  each 
other — fell — could  not  rise  again.  One  man  had 
his  skull  smashed  with  a  blow  from  a  rifle-butt ; 
another  was  run  through  his  back  with  a  bayonet. 
And  the  hand-grenades  kept  on  crashing  about 
us.     Bodies  were  torn  and  limbs  rent  asunder. 


132  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

The  air  was  like  one  sounding  string  of  cracking 
and  crashing,  of  shouts  and  yells,  of  roars  and 
moans. 

"  Not  till  we  had  reached  the  next  line  of 
trenches  did  we  get  any  rest — the  few  of  us  who 
were  left. 

"  The  enemy  slowly  withdrew  to  our  deserted 
position.  But  still  the  hand-grenades  were 
hurled  at  us. 

"  We  could  hear  them  shouting  their  victorious 
'  Hurrah  !  '  and  their  scornful  *  Bpche  '  as  we 
were  almost  fainting  under  the  furious  heat  of 
the  attack  and  the  horror  of  the  retreat. 

"  Around  us  could  be  heard  the  moaning  of  the 
wounded.  Looking  through  the  embrasures 
through  the  underwood  with  its  split  and  broken 
trees,  we  could  see  that  it  was  filled  with  dead 
bodies  like  bundled-up  rags.  In  between  the 
crackling  of  the  machine-guns  we  could  hear 
cries  for  help.  We  could  see  figures  attempting 
to  rise,  but  sinking  back  and  remaining,  struck 
by  a  merciful  bullet  or  collapsing  with  a  last  gasp. 

"  We  could  not  go  to  their  aid.  We  were  still 
under  fire  from  the  foe. 

"  Our  captain  was  lying  a  little  way  in  front. 
He  was  in  a  half-sitting  posture  with  his  face 
towards  us.  Blood  was  streaming  down  his 
forehead,  and  he  was  stretching  out  one  arm. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  133 

The  bright  moonlight  rested  upon  his  face  and 
made  its  outUne  sharp  and  clear.  We  could  see 
one  or  two  others  by  his  side,  also  groping  about 
with  their  hands.  Their  teeth  gleamed  white, 
like  those  of  a  beast  of  prey  in  a  fury. 

"  They  were  tortured  by  thirst. 

"  My  old  comrade  of  the  ranks  seized  some 
field  flasks  and  crept  over  the  breastworks. 

"  We  watched  him  in  a  fever  of  suspense. 
He  crept  out,  flat  on  the  ground,  dragging  the 
flasks  after  him  in  one  hand.  A  volley  from  a 
machine-gun  swept  towards  him.  We  ducked 
hastily  and  heard  the  bullets  whistling  over  our 
heads. 

"  After  a  little  while  we  again  looked  through 
the  embrasures.  He  had  now  reached  the  cap- 
tain and  the  two  others  and  held  out  the  flasks 
to  them.  They  drank  in  eager  gulps  and  then 
quietly  lay  down  again. 

"  Then  he  crawled  further  on.  There  were 
others  who  were  given  to  drink,  until  the  flasks 
were  empty. 

"  He  crawled  back,  still  flat  on  the  ground, 
dragging  himself  backwards  with  his  hands.  We 
stared  at  him  in  breathless  suspense.  They 
must  have  noticed  him  on  the  other  side,  for  a 
couple  of  volleys  more  swept  after  him,  but 
missed  him. 


134  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  He  had  now  reached  the  breastworks  and 
the  lower  part  of  his  body  was  hanging  down  the 
wall  of  the  trench.  Then  he  raised  his  head  and 
shoulders  a  moment  to  look  round. 

'*  There  was  another  volley.  We  ducked,  and 
at  the  same  moment  heard  a  half-choked  scream. 
His  body  fell  heavily  in  a  heap,  down  to  the 
bottom  of  the  trench. 

"  I  jumped  over  to  him,  lay  down  by  his  side, 
and  raised  his  head. 

"  A  stream  of  blood  was  trickling  from  his 
right  temple.  His  eyes  shone  and  glowed  as  if 
he  were  looking  at  something  bright  and  beauti- 
ful. They  rested  in  a  hasty  gleam  in  mine  as  if 
in  thanks  and  a  hurried  farewell.  Then  his 
eyelids  closed  and  his  head  fell  back  powerlessly. 
A  few  swift  twitchings  sped  over  his  face  and 
round  his  lips.    They  grew  at  last  into  a  smile. 

"  Then  he  suddenly  opened  his  eyes  and  looked 
at  me,  but  his  glance  was  now  fading  and  distant 
— restless  like  that  of  a  frightened  child. 

"  He  breathed  quickly  three  or  four  times  and 
then  I  heard  him  whisper  as  he  turned  his  face 
with  difficulty  to  mine  : 

"  ^  Remember — home.  .  .  .  ' 

''  There  was  a  last  panting  sigh.  His  face 
twitched  in  a  hasty,  trembling  grimace. 

"  He  was  dead. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  135 

"  He  died  like  a  hero.  I  do  not  think  it  is  too 
much  to  say  that.  He  was  a  hero  in  his  faithful 
helpfulness  of  comrades  who  were  fainting  for 
something  to  drink. 

"  True,  it  meant  neither  life  nor  death  to  any 
of  them.  They  were  already  doomed.  But 
I  believe  he  brightened  their  very  last  moments 
and  softened  the  sting  of  death. 

"  It  was  thoroughly  fine  and  warm-hearted, 
infinitely  great  and  good  of  him  to  do  what  he 
did. 

"  I  did  not  forget  my  promise.  I  wrote  to  his 
wife,  and  I  wrote  as  I  had  promised  to  write. 
I  told  her  that  he  had  died  like  a  hero — that  was 
what  his  little  daughter  was  to  read  about  him 
some  day  when  she  was  old  enough  to  understand 
and  to  be  proud  of  it. 

"  Yes — he  had  a  hero's  death.  He  had  a 
somewhat  slow  and  heavy  mind  ;  he  did  not  think 
very  deeply  about  the  problems  of  either  life  or 
death.  But  he  offered  up  his  life  to  sweeten  the 
hour  of  death  for  others. 

"  Is  not  that  enough  to  make  a  hero's  wreath 
about  the  brows  of  a  poor  and  faithful  Branden- 
burg peasant  ?    I  think  so. 

"  Anyhow,  it  seems  to  me  that  many  have 
been  made  heroes  for  far  less  than  that. 


136  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  My  old  comrade's  death  made  a  very  strong 
impression  on  me.  It  sounds  strange,  perhaps, 
when  one  has  seen  hundreds  and  hundreds  fall 
and  die  around  one,  and  seen  it  with  that 
indifference  that  comes  at  last  from  habit. 

"  Nevertheless  the  impression  was  deep  and 
strong. 

"  The  others  had  died,  too.  Quite  true.  But 
whom  did  they  leave  behind  ?  Who  wept  over 
them  ?  A  father  perhaps,  or  a  mother.  A 
wife  and  Uttle  children.  Probably.  Yet  it 
was  not  the  same,  for  I  did  not  know  their 
hearts. 

*'  But  I  knew  the  beautiful  and  hidden  cord 
that  bound  my  old  comrade  to  his  wife  and  little 
daughter.  He  had  spoken  of  them  with  such 
warmth  and  tenderness — so  lovingly  and  faith- 
fully. They  were  the  sole  joy  of  his  toilsome  life, 
as  he  was  theirs.  She  was  so  happy  in  him,  and 
believed  so  firmly  that  he  would  come  home  again 
to  her  and  their  little  girl.  And  then  the  future 
was  before  them — a  long,  long  future  in  love  and 
in  labour  shared,  and  in  mutual  faithfulness 
and  common  care  of  their  little  child. 

"  Every  single  hour  since  he  left  home  she 
would  surely  dedicate  to  him.  His  image  had 
been  woven  into  all  her  prayers  and  all  her  hopes. 
She  had  toiled  and  laboured  to  keep  their  little 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  137 

home  together,  and  to  show  him,  when  he  came 
back,  the  worth  of  her  love  and  loyalty. 

"  And  one  day  she  received  the  message  that 
he  was  dead.  .  .  .  True,  he  had  died  hke  a 
hero — yet  he  was  dead. 

"  And  death  is  death,  even  though  memory 
adds  hero  to  the  name.  The  happiness  and 
future  of  two  people  is  for  ever  lost. 

"  Those  were  the  thoughts  that  constantly 
returned  to  me  whenever  I  remembered  my  old 
comrade.  And  when  I  think  of  him  I  always  see 
that  uneasy,  dying  glance  and  hear  him  whisper- 
ing the  quiet  words,  the  last  he  uttered  : 

"  ^  Remember — home.  .  .  . ' 

"  At  those  times  I  ask  myself  what  were  the 
thoughts  which  at  that  moment  sped  through  his 
mind  :  whether  they  were  of  grief — of  dread — or 
of  happiness,  because  he  had  been  warm-hearted 
and  kind ;  or  whether  everything  had  been 
gathered  into  one  bright  and  happy  picture  of 
the  little  home  and  those  two  who  were  so  tenderly 
dear  to  him. 

"  Can  you  answer  me  ?    Who  can  ? 

"  Is  death  in  battle  a  joy,  or  is  it  a  terror  ? 

"  Would  you  not  give  years  of  your  life  to 
know  what  was  behind  that  dying  glance,  or 
that     last     sigh    that     formed     the    boundary 


138  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

between  life  and  death  for  one  who  was  dear  to 
you  ? 

"  Imagine  what  it  would  be  if  you  knew 
positively  that  it  had  been  the  purest  and 
brightest  joy.  Would  not  your  memories  be 
twice  as  beautiful  and  ten  times  as  happy  ?  " 


X 

"  It  is  surprising  how  little  you  think  of 
death  when  you  live  side  by  side  with  it  every 
day. 

"  One  would  imagine,  I  suppose,  that  most  of 
one's  quiet  hours  would  be  occupied  with  the 
thought  that  one  might  the  next  moment  be 
lying  dead  or  maimed  or  wounded,  as  has 
happened  in  the  course  of  time  to  so  many  of 
one's  comrades. 

"  It  is  not  so,  however.  I  have  never  feared 
or  expected  death  less  than  during  the  eighteen 
months  I  was  at  the  front — and  sometimes  in 
the  hottest  engagements. 

"It  is  only  during  the  hours  when  you  are 
lying  in  a  trench  and  cannot  shield  yourself  at 
all,  while  the  shells  are  crashing  about  you  and 
ploughing  up  everything,  that  you  sometimes 
think  that  the  next  minute  your  turn  will  perhaps 
come.     But  only  then. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  139 

"  Apart  from  that  you  take  life  pretty  care- 
lessly. You  duck  your  head  ;  you  jump  to 
one  side  or  throw  yourself  flat  on  the  ground. 
Sometimes  flying  earth  and  stones  and  splinters  of 
wood  are  hurled  at  you.  You  see  others  die  ; 
you  see  others  maimed. 

"  Yes,  quite  so.  Death  can  take  all  the  others. 
But  it  is  not  coming  to  fetch  oneself. 

"  It  can  be  the  most  awful  agony  to  lie  in  a 
trench  and  endure  all  its  torments,  or  those  of 
a  bombardment.    It  can  be  a  hell  of  horror. 

"  But  it  has  scarcely  anything  to  do  with  the 
fear  of  death. 

"  You  grow  fatalistic.  You  firmly  fix  in  your 
mind  the  idea  that  you  will  not  die  ;  and  at  last 
this  grows  into  a  conviction  that  you  cannot 
die.  At  any  rate,  that  was  the  case  with  me  ; 
and  I  think,  on  the  whole,  that  this  was  the  case 
with  all  of  us.  If  it  were  not,  fear  alone  of  the 
death  that  was  lurking  to  spring  on  us  at  any 
moment  would  turn  every  army  into  a  flock  of 
frightened  children  ;  and  an  army  is  not  com- 
posed of  such. 

"  On  the  contrary,  most  men  do  not  lack 
courage — the  courage  that  springs  from  a  happy 
and  cheery  carelessness  with  regard  to  death, 
and  a  blind,  simple  faith  that  anyhow  death  has 
no  message  for  oneself. 


140  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  There  is  really  only  one  case  in  which 
the  fear  of  death  suddenly  grips  you  with  a 
trembling  violence  and  almost  paralyses  your 
mind.  It  is  when — after  some  time  of  rest, 
during  which  your  mind  gradually  recovers 
some  of  its  balance — you  have  to  prepare  your- 
self to  go  into  immediate  attack. 

"  Not  the  first  attack  you  take  part  in.  But 
later,  when  you  have  become  thoroughly 
acquainted  with  the  horrors  of  an  attack  and 
understand  what  endless  misery  and  suffering 
it  spreads  around  it — and  still  more  when  you 
have  experienced  the  awful  spiritual  shock 
caused  by  a  repulsed  attack  and  still  more  if 
that  attack  ended  in  defeat  and  rout. 

"  Then  a  shaking  and  helpless  dread  may 
sometimes  steal  over  you.  It  feels  like  a  stran- 
gling grip  round  the  throat ;  your  heart  and  chest 
hammer  as  if  the  blood  were  going  to  burst  all 
your  veins. 

"  There  is  only  one  thing  then  that  gives 
relief — alcohol ;  and  there  are  many  who  resort 
to  it. 

"  In  civil  life  there  is  such  a  thing  as  drinking 
oneself  into  courage.  It  holds  good  no  less  in 
war.  Sometimes  great  quantities  of  spirits 
were  consumed  before  one  of  the  big  attacks. 
Many  a  time  men  drank  to  the  point  of  stupe- 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  141 

faction.  But  anxiety  was  quelled,  while  at 
the  same  time  animal  instincts  were  stirred  to 
blood  -  heat ;  and  that  was  the  object  to  be 
attained. 

"  By  this  I  do  not  mean  to  speak  disparagingly 
of  personal  courage  and  enthusiastic  disregard 
of  death.  I  have  seen  many  a  brave  and  fearless 
deed.  But  I  have  also  seen  other  things,  and  I 
am  sure  that  I  am  not  getting  on  the  wrong  side 
of  the  truth  in  saying  that  a  good  many  victories 
were  gained  in  a  fog  of  brandy  fumes. 

"  There  was  always  plenty  to  be  had  of  that 
kind  of  thing  on  the  days  of  big  attacks. 

"  It  produced  men  who  dashed  on  blindly. 
It  endowed  them  with  the  gore-dripping  grace  of 
fury  and  brutality.  It  heated  all  their  savage 
instincts  to  boiling-point. 

**  The  fact  was  that  gradually  those  whom 
one  may  call  the  veterans,  the  old  set,  had  grown 
tired,  not  only  physically,  but  mentally  too. 

"  So  long  as  you  go  forward  at  a  furious  pace 
and  all  the  walls  of  Jericho  tumble  down,  it  is 
enough  to  keep  your  courage  up  and  your 
ardour  ahve. 

"But  when  the  time  comes  in  which  you  have 
also  to  feel  the  crushing  sense  of  defeat,  and 
moreover — even  under  the  brightest  conditions, 
in  which  you  cannot  see  any  prospect  of  an  end 


142  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

to  it — when  weeks  grow  into  months  and  months 
into  years,  and  you  get  no  further — well,  then  it 
is  very  human,  I  think,  and  easy  to  understand, 
that  courage  breaks  down  and  enthusiasm  and 
grandeur  fade  into  a  gloomy  and  tired  wish 
that  it  may  all  soon  be  over,  no  matter  what  the 
result  is  to  be. 

"  I  have  heard  that  kind   of  talk  so  often 
and  everyone  will  be  able  to  understand  it. 

"  It  is  the  same  in  war  as  in  daily  life  ;  there  is 
always  a  stage  at  which  many  cannot,,  either 
physically  or  mentally,  bear  any  more,  and  when 
all  outward  claims  are  made  in  vain. 

"  *  I  pray  to  God,  night  after  night,  that  it 
may  soon  be  over.  And  now  they  are  starving 
at  home  into  the  bargain,  poor  souls  !  .  .  . ' 

"  When,  therefore,  a  chaplain  once  said — and 
this  is  the  naked  truth — that  it  was  clear  even 
to  Luther  that  God  was  our  God — solely  and 
entirely  our  God — and  in  proof  of  it  referred  to 
the  first  line  of  Luther's  well-known  hymn  : 
*Ein'  feste  Burg  ist  unset  Gott ' — our  God — 
a  God  for  us  alone — it  angered  me  to  think 
that  a  man,  about  whose  Christian  faith  I  had 
otherwise  no  reason  to  doubt,  could  permit  him- 
self such  distorted  thinking — such  blasphemy. 

"  On  the  other  hand,  I  do  not  think  that  most 
of  my  comrades  saw  how  distorted  it  was.    God 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  143. 

had  really  become  their  God,  and  cared  for  us 
and  our  affairs  and  our  families,  and  left  the 
others  to  take  care  of  themselves. 

"  They  said  so  honestly,  in  full  earnest.  They 
believed  it  with  that  force  of  conviction  that 
nothing  can  shake. 

"  To  them  the  war  was  really  God's  judgment 
on  their  enemies,  a  judgment  which  it  was  their 
mission  to  carry  out. 

"  I  remember  that  my  new  rank  comrade 
and  I  talked  about  it  one  Sunday  night,  while 
we  were  on  outpost  duty  together  at  the  edge  of 
a  forest  in  the  Argonne,  and  gazed  up  at  the 
unfathomable  depths  of  the  blue  and  star- 
strewn  sky. 

"  Thoughts  of  that  kind  come  into  your  mind 
so  easily  on  a  night  like  that. 

"  '  God  has  now  shown  again  that  He  is 
ours^  he  said.  ^  He  has  given  us  a  victory  yonder 
on  the  eastern  side.  We  have  taken  Riga  and 
nearly  two-hundred  thousand  Russians.  We 
shall  go  straight  to  Petersburg  now.' 

"  He  was  a  young  schoolmaster  from  Mecklen- 
burg. He  had  got  hold  of  one  of  the  many 
extraordinary  reports  of  victories  that  often 
ran  their  course  along  the  front,  and  which  came 
no  one  quite  knew  whence. 

"  '  Don't    you    think    we    should    keep    God 


144  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

outside  that  ?  '  I  answered.  ^  On  the  whole, 
I  think  we  have  far  too  much  to  do  with  God. 
It  sometimes  sounds  like  blasphemy.' 

*'  He  looked  at  me  in  astonishment,  and  then 
said  : 

"  '  You  don't  believe,  perhaps,  that  God  is 
on  our  side,  that  we  are  the  rod  of  chastisement 
over  the  others  because  of  their  sins  and  their 
immorality. 

"  ^  Rip  up  their  stomachs — smash  in  their 
skulls.  .  .  \  We  serve  God  in  that  way.  That  is 
our  divine  service.' 

"  I  remember  smiling,  and  he  looked  at  me  with 
almost  an  indignant  glance  when  I  answered 
after  a  little  while  : 

"  '  To  tell  you  the  truth,  I  don't  think  God 
interferes  in  that  kind  of  thing.  He  is  neither 
with  "  wj"  nor  with  the  others.' 

"  He  was  silent  a  while.  Then  he  said,  and 
there  was  something  like  mockery  in  his  voice  : 

"  '  Oh,  well,  of  course — you  are  a  Dane.  I  had 
forgotten  that,  to  tell  you  the  truth.' 

"  I  had  a  hot  answer  on  my  lips.  It  was  the 
first  time  anyone  had  spoken  of  my  nationality 
in  that  way. 

"  But  I  held  my  tongue.  For  if  this  was  the 
man's  conviction,  it  was  no  use  talking  to  him  ; 
and  it  could  not  make  me  either  better  or  worse. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  145 

"  I  must  add,  however,  that  he  immediately 
begged  my  pardon  for  his  words.  He  did  not 
mean  any  harm,  he  said.  They  had  slipped  out 
of  his  mouth  unawares. 

"  '  I  have  the  highest  respect  and  esteem 
for  all  of  you,'  he  said  at  last ;  *  we  all  have.  It 
must  be  hard  for  you  and  your  compatriots — 
having  to  ... ' 

"  I  could  have  hugged  him  for  those  words. 
They  seemed  to  me  like  a  mark  of  distinction  on 
my  breast. 

*,*  He  was  hit  by  a  shell  the  next  day  and  died 
immediately  after.  Two  days  later  my  turn 
came." 

My  friend  ceased  speaking  a  while.  He  closed 
his  eyes,  and  at  the  same  moment  a  quick 
trembling  passed  over  his  grey  face.  Then  he 
smiled — a  somewhat  faint  and  tired  smile.  It 
looked  as  though  joy  and  pain  met  at  the  same 
instant  in  his  mind. 

Then  he  continued  :        ' 

"  It  was  one  of  the  first  days  of  real  spring 
in  the  Argonne. 

"  We  had  had  a  comparatively  quiet  and 
peaceful  time  for  about  a  week.  There  had  been 
a  few  skirmishes  here  and  there,  but  otherwise 
the  days  had  slipped  by  under  incessant  artillery 
fire. 


146  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  The  weather  was  glorious.  A  richly 
perfumed,  vigorous  French  spring,  with  the 
most  beautiful  blue  skies  and  mild,  soft 
nights. 

"  It  was  saddening,  though,  to  feel  the  coming 
of  spring  over  this  devastated  country  :  villages 
in  ruins  ;  fields  torn  up  by  shells  or  trampled 
down  and  as  barren  as  stones,  and  woods  torn 
and  shattered  as  if  a  gigantic  scythe  had  mown 
them  down  and  fires  had  scorched  away  the 
undergrowth. 

"  For  one  who  has  grown  up  close  to  the  soil 
and  seen  its  generous  bounty,  and  who  has 
grown  to  love  every  single  little  fertile  mound, 
it  was  heart-breaking  to  see  how  this  country 
had  been  maltreated,  and  how  homes  and 
affection  and  human  happiness  had  been  blighted 
and  laid  waste. 

"  Those  who  are  guilty  will  have  a  heavy 
reckoning  to  pay  some  day,  when  they  have  to 
settle  their  accounts  with  God. 

"  And  there  will  be  many  who  will  not  grant 
them  a  moment's  peace  or  mercy. 

"  I  had  had  a  horrible  night.  A  nightmare 
of  horrors  had  torn  at  my  mind.  From  midnight 
to  dawn  I  had  had  a  painful  struggle  to  keep 
myself  awake.  But  it  was  not  much  use.  An 
incident  I  had  witnessed  on  the  eastern  side  had 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  147 

come  back  to  my  remembrance,  and  I  could  not 
get  rid  of  it  again. 

"  It  was  not  nearly  so  terrible,  perhaps,  as 
many  of  the  other  things  I  had  seen,  but  it  has 
caused  me  more  pain  than  most  of  them. 

"  One  morning  I  received  orders  to  com- 
mandeer twelve  horses  in  the  course  of  the  day. 
Commandeering  is  not  a  cheerful  job.  But  what 
does  that  matter  ?  An  order  is  an  order.  I  was 
allowed  to  take  four  men  with  me,  and  we  set 
off  on  our  uncertain  quest  in  the  occupied 
district. 

"  I  shall  never  forget  that  day. 

"  It  was  already  noon,  and  still  we  had  no 
horses.  Wherever  we  went  the  population  was 
in  the  most  miserable  plight.  Moreover,  most  of 
them  had  fled,  and  those  who  were  still  left  on 
the  farms  could  hardly  hold  themselves  up  for 
hunger  ;  and  I  could  not  bring  myself  to  take 
the  horses  from  the  carts  of  the  refugees. 

"  At  one  farm  the  owner  took  us  into  the 
sitting-room  and  ranged  himself,  his  wife,  and 
his  eight  children  in  a  row  like  organ-pipes. 
Then  he  bared  his  chest  and  asked  me  to  stab 
him  and  put  an  end  to  their  misery. 

"  What  was  I  to  do  ?  I  had  not  been  taught 
to  be  hard-hearted.  I  had  not  the  courage  to 
rob    the    man   of   his   last   possession — a   poor, 


148  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

skinny  horse  that  was  to  drag  him  and  his 
family  on  their  mournful  flight  from  their  home. 

"  We  left  them  and  went  on. 

"  I  managed,  however,  to  collect  eleven  horses 
in  the  course  of  the  afternoon.  One  was  still 
wanting. 

"  By  that  time  it  was  late  and  we  were  think- 
ing of  giving  up  our  quest.  But  just  as  we  had 
decided  to  go  back  a  one-horsed  vehicle  came 
along  the  road.  The  horse  was  a  powerful 
chestnut,  the  very  one  I  wanted  to  complete  the 
dozen. 

"  We  stopped  the  man  who  was  driving  the 
cart  and  looked  at  the  horse.  At  the  same  time 
we  noticed  pillows  and  quilts  and  several  other 
things  sticking  out  from  beneath  the  canvas 
cover. 

"  The  man  was  alone  in  the  cart.  It  seemed 
he  had  no  family.  Apparently  he  was  quite 
alone  in  his  flight  from  home. 

"  When  he  understood  that  I  meant  to  take 
his  horse  he  broke  into  hard,  bitter  sobbing. 

"  It  is  a  terrible  sight  to  see  a  man  weep.  But 
he  made  no  sign  of  attempting  to  prevent  us 
from  taking  the  horse  ;  nor  did  he  plead  with  us. 

"  He  only  threw  the  cover  aside. 

"  What  I  saw  underneath  made  my  blood 
run  cold,  and  I  gasped  for  breath. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  149 

"  There,  in  the  cart,  resting  amongst  the 
pillows,  lay  a  young  and  beautiful  woman,  but 
she  was  dead.  The  Madonna  face  was  wreathed 
in  thick,  fair,  golden  hair,  flowing  down  over  her 
shoulders  and  her  naked  breast.  In  one  arm 
she  held  a  newly-born  infant,  pressed  closely  to 
her  bosom,  as  if  she  would  even  in  death  protect 
it  from  life's  harm. 

"  The  light  of  the  setting  sun  fell  softly  on  the 
pale  face  and  tinged  it  with  a  strange,  living  hue. 
At  the  same  time  it  revealed  to  us  the  despairing 
pain  in  the  features. 

"  She  had  been  confined  and  had  died  on  the 
road  during  their  flight,  she  and  the  child. 

"  Is  not  that  awful  to  think  of  ?  And  yet  it 
is  only  one  of  the  quiet,  unknown  incidents  out 
of  many  thousands. 

"  It  was  the  sight  of  this  man's  silent,  fathom- 
less grief,  and  it  was  the  dead  woman  and  the 
little  newly-born  child  that  stood  before  me 
continually  aU  night  until  the  day  dawned. 

"  What  an  awful  experience  for  that  man  ! 
What  a  fate  for  a  wife  and  mother  1  What  an 
ending  to  all  that  she  must  surely  have  looked 
forward  to  with  joy,  and  which  must  un- 
doubtedly have  made  up  his  and  her  happiest 
thoughts  and  longings  for  many  days ! 


ISO  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  And  then,  tortured  to  death  by  fear  and 
horror,  to  bring  forth  her  child  in  a  jolting  cart, 
during  a  flight  from  a  ruined  home  ! " 

My  friend  was  silent  a  little  while  and  looked 
at  me.  There  were  tears  in  my  eyes,  but  I  tried 
to  hide  them. 

He  smiled  quietly.   , 

Men  may  always  be  allowed  to  weep  over 
the  sorrows  of  others.  It  is  only  over  their  own 
that  they  may  not.  Yet,  after  all,  there  are 
moments  when  they  cannot  refrain  even  then. 

There  have  been  many  in  which  I  could  not. 

Then  he  went  on  with  his  story. 

"  Towards  morning  our  peace  and  quiet  came 
to  an  end.  The  enemy  began  a  hot  and  incessant 
bombardment.  It  went  on  for  eight  hours  with- 
out ceasing.  Our  barbed  wire  entanglements 
were  snapped  asunder  like  cobwebs,  and  our 
trenches  were  at  last  nothing  but  a  confused 
heap  of  earth  and  scraps  of  beams.  It  was 
difHcult  at  length  to  find  cover.  From  all  over 
came  screams  for  help.  But  there  was  no  one 
who  could  help.  Each  one  had  enough  to  do 
to  look  after  himself. 

"  Then  they  began  to  attack  us  all  along  the 
line — the  greater  part  of  five  hundred  yards,  I 
believe.  Their  hand-grenades  came  flying  at  us 
like  hailstones.    They  did  not,  however,  manage 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  151 

to  come  up  to  our  trenches.  Our  machine-guns 
stopped  them,  and  their  line  began  to  falter. 

"  We  went  at  them  with  the  bayonet.  It  was 
a  savage  and  reeking  hot  encounter.  We  had 
been  heated  by  the  violence  of  the  bombardment. 
It  was  a  furious  brutality  that  knew  neither 
mercy  nor  lenience  :  a  bestial  raging  with 
bayonets  and  rifle-butts  and  bare  fists,  a  roaring 
and  howling  chaos,  that  carried  away  one's 
reason  and  senses. 

"  I  had  my  right  arm  splintered  by  a  blow 
from  a  rifle-butt  a  little  below  the  elbow. 

"  It  cracked  like  match-wood.  The  stump 
hung  dangling  in  a  few  strips  of  flesh.  I  fell 
down  at  the  same  moment,  while  a  hot  tingling 
ran  right  through  me,  a  sweet  and  glorious 
dizziness,  and  a  surging  up  of  beautiful  and 
shining  colours  before  my  vision. 

"  But  after  that  I  don't  remember  much  more. 
It  only  seemed  to  me  that,  all  of  a  sudden,  every- 
thing was  quiet  around  me,  hushed  and  gentle. 
And  I  felt  no  pain — only  a  happy,  peaceful  calm 
and  a  tickling  kind  of  warmth  through  my  breast. 

"  How  long  I  lay  in  this  semi-conscious  state 
I  don't  know.  When  I  had  recovered  a  little 
I  felt  an  unbearable  pain  in  my  arm,  and  some- 
thing tugging  at  my  uninjured  hand  in  short, 
excited  jerks. 


152  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  I  turned  my  head  and  saw  a  young,  pale  face 
close  to  mine,  and  two  light,  burning  eyes,  clear 
and  shining,  gazing  into  my  own. 

"  They  belonged  to  a  lad  of  about  seventeen 
or  eighteen.  The  outlines  of  his  face  were  still 
soft  and  child-like,  and  there  was  the  soft 
down  of  first  youth  about  his  lips.  His  breast 
was  bared  and  one  hand  was  still  convulsively 
clenched  against  his  throat.  Blood  was  trickling 
out  between  his  fingers  and  flowing  down  in  a 
thickened  stream  over  his  chest. 

"  Suddenly  he  jerked  himself  over  towards 
me,  gripped  my  hand  in  both  his  own  and  gazed 
at  me.  His  face,  which  was  drawn  with  pain,  was 
all  at  once  suffused  with  a  happy  smile,  and  I 
heard  him  whisper,  in  a  voice  that  trembled  with 

joy: 

"  '  Then  you  have  come,  after  all,  dear  little 
mother — you  have  come.  .  .  . ' 

"  His  smile  grew.  His  eyes  almost  laughed 
for  joy.  A  little  fainter,  in  a  little  more  of  a 
whisper,  came  the  same  words  again  : 

"  '  Then  you  have  come,  after  all,  dear  little 
mother — you  have  come.  .  .  . ' 

"  I  leaned  over  to  him,  so  far  that  I  could  touch 
his  forehead  with  my  lips.  I  kissed  him  on  the 
forehead,  which  was  cold  and  damp  with  sweat, 
and  whispered  into  his  ear  : 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  153 

"  *  Yes,  my  darling  boy  ;  your  mother  is  here 
now.  .  .  .  ' 

"  I  felt  two  hands  gripping  mine  till  it  almost 
hurt,  and  again  I  heard  a  quiet  whisper,  which, 
however,  I  did  not  understand. 

"  I  remained  there  with  my  lips  on  his  fore- 
head, until  I  heard  his  last  sigh  and  a  quiet, 
breaking  gurgle. 

"  Then  I  looked  at  his  face.  The  open,  glazed 
eyes  gazed  upwards  as  if  they  looked  far  away 
at  something  beautiful  and  glorious,  and  about 
the  soft,  yielding  boyish  lips  there  was  an 
expression  of  infinite  rapture. 

"  But  then,  his  mother  had  been  with  him  in 
the  hour  of  his  death  and  had  kissed  him  on  his 
forehead." 

My  friend's  lips  trembled,  and  his  eyelids 
quivered. 

Then  he  said  quickly,  as  if  he  wanted  to  banish 
that  remembrance  as  quickly  as  possible  : 

"  After  that  I  don't  remember  anything  more 
of  what  happened  to  me,  until  the  day  when  I 
recovered  consciousness  in  a  hospital  in  one  of 
the  towns  on  the  Rhine." 


1 54  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 


XI 

"  I  remember  my  waking  up  at  the  hospital 
very  clearly  and  distinctly. 

"  It  was  like  a  beautiful  dream. 

"  I  felt  a  soft,  warm  hand  on  my  forehead.  I 
saw  a  pale  and  gentle  woman's  face  bending  over 
mine  and  a  pair  of  kind  blue  eyes  trying  to  meet 
my  glance.  As  our  eyes  met  I  heard  her  say,  in 
a  sweet,  low  voice,  as  tender  as  a  happy  mother's  : 

" '  That's  right,  my  dear.  You'll  soon  be 
better  now.    Just  you  wait  and  see.' 

"  I  looked  about  me.  I  did  not  quite  under- 
stand where  I  was.  My  brain  was  tired,  my  head 
heavy.  And  everything  about  me  seemed  so 
strange  and  unfamiliar. 

"  It  was  so  white  ;   so  light ;  so  quiet. 

"  I  felt  a  pain  near  my  shoulder-blade  and 
tried  to  alter  my  position  a  little. 

"  Then  I  understood  that  my  right  arm  was 
gone. 

"  I  could  feel  that  I  turned  pale,  and  a  burn- 
ing and  tingling  sensation  ran  right  through 
my  body.  Things  swam  and  flickered  before 
my  eyes,  and  I  felt  as  if  I  were  going  to  swoon. 

"  Then  I  caught  the  young  woman's  eyes. 

"  She  looked  at  me  with  such  a  warm  and 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  155 

comforting  smile,  as  she  took  my  hand  and 
stroked  it  between  her  own,  and  said  : 

"  *  There,  there,  my  dear  boy !  You  really 
must  not  go  and  be  ill  again,  you  know.' 

"  I  had  to  close  my  eyes.  The  perspiration 
lay  like  steam  on  my  forehead,  and  I  felt  that 
even  through  the  closed  lids  the  white  light  in 
the  room  tore  at  my  sensitive  nerves. 

"  Again  I  felt  her  soft  and  gentle  hand  on  my 
brow  and  a  warm  pressure  of  the  hand  that 
kept  a  firm  hold  of  mine. 

"  There  was  safety  :  a  wonderful,  happy  safety  ; 
an  all-pervading  feeling  of  being  happily  and 
safely  away  from  all  those  other  things  that  I 
had  been  through. 

"  What  an  extraordinary  contrast  between 
there  and  here  ! 

"  There  : — Malice,  Savagery  ;  Hate — the  fury 
of  all  evil  instincts ;  the  lust  of  brutal 
thoughts. 

"  And  here  : — Gentleness  ;  Peace  ;  Mercy — 
a  warm  and  gentle  woman's  hand  against  a  hot 
forehead  ;  tender  words  as  to  the  child  that  one 
loves  above  everything  and  everybody. 

"  It  was  both  beautiful  and  beyond  under- 
standing. It  made  my  chest  heave,  and  I  felt 
the  tears  smarting  under  my  eyelids. 

"  The  young  woman  continued  standing  beside 


iS6  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

my  bed  with  my  hand  in  hers.     And  not  till 
now  did  I  really  begin  to  notice  her. 

"  She  was  quite  young — probably  not  more 
than  twenty-two.  Her  hair  was  brown  and  lay 
chastely  over  a  white  brow.  Her  face  was  pure 
and  soft  in  every  feature,  but  sometimes  there 
were  lines  of  deep  sadness  about  her  lips,  and 
her  eyes  would  change  in  swift  gleams  to  and 
fro,  from  happy  gentleness  to  sudden  melan- 
choly, as  when  rapid  little  clouds  come  and  go 
before  the  sun. 

"  She  said  nothing.  She  had  laid  down  my 
hand  and  was  gently  smoothing  my  pillow. 
She  did  it  as  if  she  were  making  a  baby  com- 
fortable in  its  cradle. 

"  Then  she  smiled  quietly.  I  nodded  brightly 
to  her  and  took  her  hand. 

"  She  nodded  back  to  me  and  said  : 

"  '  You  did  have  a  bad  time,  didn't  you  ? 
We  were  really  afraid  to  hope  that  we  might 
keep  you.  You  have  not  been  yourself  for 
nearly  a  fortnight.  But  I  think  we  may  hope 
you  have  got  over  it  now.  And  in  a  short  time 
you  will  be  able  to  go  home.' 

*-''Home!' 

"  The  word  burnt  itself  violently  into  my 
mind  the  instant  I  heard  it. 

"  To  think  that  perhaps   in  a  short  time   I 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  157 

could  go  home  !  .  .  .  Yes,  exactly.  ...  Of 
course.  When  one's  right  arm  is  gone  one  is 
not  of  much  use  for  the  business  of  war. 

"  At  that  moment  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  had 
been  singularly  fortunate,  and  that  I  had  paid  for 
the  good  fortune  by  doing  my  duty  to  the  last. 

"  Paid  in  full,  therefore.    We  were  quits. 

"  I  know  that  I  lay  there  smiling  happily  at 
the  thought.  In  my  mind's  eye  I  saw,  sketched 
in  rapid  outlines,  everything  connected  with 
my  home,  from  the  greatest  to  the  least,  and  it 
filled  me  with  a  trembling  joy. 

"  The  young  nurse's  eyes  rested  tremblingly 
on  mine. 

"  '  You  look  quite  happy,'  she  said. 

"  She  looked  at  the  engagement  ring  on  my 
hand. 

"  '  You  are  engaged  —  married  perhaps  ? 
Where  do  you  come  from,  by  the  way  ?  ' 

"  I  glanced  at  her  hands,  quite  unconsciously. 
I  saw  a  thin,  plain  ring  on  her  third  finger. 
I  answered  : 

"  '  Engaged.  And  my  home  is  in  North 
Schleswig.    I  am  a  Dane.' 

"  I  said  it  very  quietly. 

"  She  said  nothing  for  a  while.  Then  she 
nodded,  and  said,  in  a  voice  trembling  with 
gentleness  : 


iS8  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  *  Then  I  understand  why  you  are  looking  so 
happy.  I  am  very  glad  for  your  sake,  and  for 
hers.' 

"  I  seized  her  hand  and  kissed  it.  I  understood 
now  that  I  was  allowed  to  be  happy. 

"  I  looked  at  the  ring  on  her  finger  and  then 
at  her. 

"  The  smile  faded  away  from  her  face.  The 
soft  lines  disappeared  in  sadness,  and  her  eyes 
blinked. 

''  '  He  fell  at  Liege,'  she  whispered  softly. 
*  He  was  only  two-and-twenty.  His  father  is 
gone,  too,  and  his  brother.  And  my  two 
brothers.  We  are  only  women  left  now.  It  i« 
a  hard  time.' 

"  I  bent  my  head  and  closed  my  eyes. 

"  Such  great  grief  and  so  good  to  others  !  So 
self-forgetting  !    So  generous  in  love  ! 

"  But  then,  only  women  can  be  like  that — 
women  who  have  loved  and  have  therefore 
been  taught  the  value  of  love,  and  what  joy  a 
kind  word  and  a  warm,  gentle  hand  on  a  restless 
brow  is  to  one  in  pain ! 

** '  Now  you  must  rest,'  she  said.  '  You  can't 
bear  very  much  yet.  I  am  so  glad  you  are 
getting  well  now.' 

"  Then  she  went  on  to  another  bed.  She  gave 
me  a  little  friendly,  parting  nod,  and  I  followed 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  159 

her  with  my  eyes.  Her  step  was  as  light  and 
buoyant  as  that  of  a  young  girl  whose  life  has 
been  nothing  but  sunshine. 

"  She  had  smiles  and  kindness  to  spare  for 
all  of  us  suffering  ones.  And  she  had  only  bitter 
grief  herself. 

"  I  looked  about  me  to  see  the  room  in  which 
I  was  lying.  I  had  had  no  opportunity  of  doing 
so  before. 

"  It  was  large  and  bright  and  white.  I  heard 
later  that  it  had  been  a  ballroom  before  it  was 
turned  into  a  hospital.  It  stood  in  a  big  park. 
From  where  I  lay  I  could  see  the  tops  of  some 
large  trees  and  far  away  some  mountains  loom- 
ing blue  in  the  sunny  haze. 

"  The  ceiling  was  vaulted  and  white,  and  two 
heavy  candelabra  threw  a  golden  and  festive 
glitter  over  the  room.  Round  the  cornice  there 
was  a  frieze  of  dancing  cupids,  and  satyrs  play- 
ing on  reed  pipes. 

"  A  bright  and  beautiful  home  for  happiness 
and  the  joy  of  life. 

"  It  had  other  inmates  now  than  gay  men  and 
laughing  women. 

^' Three  rows  of  beds  stood  lengthways  down 
the  room — two  hundred  altogether,  I  heard 
afterwards — and  they  were  all  occupied. 

"  So  much  misery  gathered  in  one  place  !     So 


i6o  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

many  maimed  and  crippled  men  in  the  prime  of 
life! 

"  I  could  just  see  the  nearest  ones.  I  had  not 
strength  enough  yet  to  move  in  the  bed.  But 
what  I  could  see  was  quite  sad  enough. 

"  Not  far  from  me  a  man  was  sitting  up  in 
bed  while  two  nurses  supported  his  back.  His 
chest  was  bare.  He  was  tearing  his  linen  to 
pieces  with  violent  tugs.  His  hair  was  shining 
white.  A  terrible  night  in  the  trenches,  of  course. 
Twelve  hours  under  incessant  fire  from  machine- 
guns  and  no  possibility  of  a  moment's  rest. 
Every  minute  a  nerve-wearing  watchfulness  in 
keeping  under  cover — twelve  hours  in  terror  of 
death,  perhaps. 

"  At  any  rate,  it  was  said  that  that  was  what 
had  made  him  white. 

"  He  had  a  bullet  wound  in  his  chest,  and  was 
nearing  his  end.  His  face  looked  almost  green. 
Now  and  then  he  screamed,  and  his  piercing 
shrieks  rang  through  the  room. 

"  I  turned  my  head  away  ;  I  could  not  bear 
the  sight.  It  suddenly  pressed  all  the  horrors 
of  remembrance  into  my  mind. 

"  I  looked  in  the  other  direction. 

"  A  little  way  off  lay  a  man  fumbling  at  the  edge 
of  the  sheet  with  his  fingers.  He  had  bandages 
over  his  eyes  and  down  over  his  nose.    It  was  said 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  i6i 

his  eyes  had  been  blinded  and  his  nose  was  only 
a  gaping  wound. 

"  All  the  time  he  lay  moaning,  unhappy  like 
a  child  in  agony. 

"  *  What  will  my  little  mother  say  ?  .  .  .  ' 

"  The  sights  that  met  one's  gaze  in  this  ball- 
room were  not  cheerful.  Nevertheless — there 
was  peace.  Peace  I  And  there  were  gentle 
women  with  kind  words  and  soft  hands.  There 
was  hope  yearning  for  life,  even  though  it  might 
be  dreary  and  hard  enough  for  most  of  us,  and 
even  though  we  did  not  go  out  again  in  possession 
of  all  our  limbs  or  with  our  old  strength. 

"  They  clung  to  life,  all  of  them.  Most  of 
them  with  an  unwavering  confidence  in  good 
coming  out  of  it  all ;  many  with  smiles  and 
childlike  happiness,  even  though  the  future 
held  out  only  a  pair  of  crutches  or  some  other 
physical  misery. 

"  Now  and  then  there  was  one  with  hopes  of 
going  to  the  front  again — sometimes  not  only 
with  hopes,  but  with  eager,  ardent  longing.  Hate 
was  still  vigorous  and  hot  ;  confidence  in  victory 
still  unshaken  and  strong. 

"  Man  is  strange.  .  .  . 

"  But  it  has  to  be  like  that,  I  suppose.  You 
have  to  feel  like  that,  of  course,  when  you  are 
convinced  that  you  are  suffering  and  striving 


1 62  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

for  some  great  end,  something  that  has  made  a 
covenant  with  the  future  and  eternity,  and  every- 
thing that  you  cherish  with  every  fibre  of  your 
being. 

"  Something  that  must  not  be  lost — something 
far  beyond  time  and  reason. 

"  It  was  not  always  like  this,  however,  for 
those  who  had  gained  their  experience  of  the 
hell  of  the  trenches  and  were  still  out  there  and 
suffering  in  them. 

.  •  •  •  • 

^ "  I  had  a  very  happy  time  during  those  months 
I  spent  in  the  hospital — happy  both  while  I 
was  still  confined  to  bed,  and,  later  on,  when  I 
was  allowed  to  be  up  and  go  out. 

"  We  all  met  with  such  great  kindness — often 
with  such  touching  and  unselfish  love.  It  was 
not  only  the  nurses  and  doctors  who  did  every- 
thing they  could  to  be  kind  to  us.  There  were 
many  people,  complete  strangers  to  us,  who 
showed  us  all  the  warmth  a  good  and  kind  heart 
can  hold. 

"  Quite  young,  blushing  little  girls  brought  us 
flowers  and  fruit  from  their  fathers  and  mothers. 
They  came  timidly  and  quietly,  yet  it  made 
them  very  happy  to  be  able  to  bring  us  a  message 
from  the  spring  and  the  sun  outside.  From 
life. 


FORCED  TO   FIGHT  163 

"  Women  came,  young  and  elderly — mostly 
elderly  women  ;  and  nearly  all  of  them  were 
dressed  in  mourning.  They  spoke  but  rarely 
of  their  sorrows.  But  their  black  garments  and 
their  long,  black  veils  told  a  sufficient  tale. 

"  There  was  something  pathetically  sad  about 
them,  but  at  times  a  soft  and  gentle  smile  shone 
through  the  sadness.  It  was  as  if  they  felt  proud 
to  think  of  those  for  whom  they  wore  mourning — 
as  if  their  black  attire  was  a  mark  of  distinction, 
their  Iron  Cross  ;  something  that  told  everyone 
that  they  had  offered  up  their  share  for  the 
Fatherland. 

"  They  went  about  so  quietly  amongst  the 
beds  :  spoke  kind  and  friendly  words  ;  stroked 
a  feverish  brow  ;  smoothed  the  pillow  of  a  rest- 
less one  with  maternal  tenderness. 

"  There  was  never  any  reflection  on  their  faces 
of  all  the  sad  things  they  saw.    There  was  always 
the  same  gentleness,  always  the  same  kind  smile 
tinged  with  sadness,  that  comforted  and  gave 
sympathy  at  the  same  time. 

"  Nearly  every  day  during  the  time  I  was  in 
the  hospital  a  middle-aged,  grey-haired  lady 
came  to  my  bed.  Her  face  was  pale,  almost 
white,  but  it  was  beautiful  and  had  an  expression 
of  touching  kindness.  Her  eyes  were  bright  and 
gentle,    but    had    in    their    depths    that    great 


i64  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

warmth  that  speaks  of  a  tender  heart  easily 
moved. 

"  She  gave  me  many  good  gifts — flowers, 
sweets,  and  cigars  ;  and  every  time  she  looked 
as  kindly  and  tenderly  at  me  as  if  I  had  been  her 
own  child.  She  stroked  my  hair  and  forehead, 
and  patted  my  hand  at  parting,  every  time  she 
left. 

"  She  could  not  have  been  kinder  or  gentler 
if  she  had  been  my  mother. 

"  She  hardly  ever  said  anything  but  the  same 
words  : 

"  '  Well,  thank  God,  you  are  getting  on  well, 
my  dear  boy.  You  are  looking  quite  brisk  and 
well  to-day.' 

"  Yes — how  did  I  look,  I  wondered  ? 

"  There  was  something  I  felt  a  desire  to  know. 
I  had  not  seen  my  face  in  a  glass  for  many  a  day. 

"  I  was  allowed  to  look  one  day,  and  I  shud- 
dered at  what  I  saw. 

"  The  white  hair  at  the  temples  ;  the 
emaciated  face  ;  the  grey,  sallow  skin,  stretched 
like  parchment  over  the  bones  ;  the  staring 
eyes !  .  .  . 

"  A  burning  tingle  ran  through  me. 

"  Was  that  I — that  wasted  face  !  I  threw 
away  the  mirror  and  seized  my  head  in  my 
hand.      I  felt  as  if  I  were  going  to  be  ill.    I  had 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  165 

choking  sensations,  and  the  perspiration  stood 
out  on  my  forehead  like  dew.  It  was  a  ghost 
I  had  seen,  and  not  a  man  of  flesh  and  blood. 

"  A  face  I  did  not  know  at  all. 

"  Imagine  not  being  able  to  recognise  your 
own  face ! 

"  It  is  harrowing  ;  appalling.  I  can  feel  the 
terror  running  through  me  every  time  I  am 
reminded  of  it  ;  and  even  now,  when  I  look  at 
my  face  in  a  glass,  I  have  something  of  the  same 
feeling,  although  I  have  gradually  become 
used  to  seeing  how  the  torments  of  the  trenches 
and  the  sufferings  of  fever  can  waste  a  face 
for  many  a  long  day. 

"  Ah,  well,  well  1  There  are  many  white  lies. 
Thank  God  there  are  ! 

"  The  old  lady's  words  about  my  looking  quite 
brisk  and  well  were  of  that  kind.  But  I  was 
grateful  to  her  for  them  all  the  same. 

"  It  was  her  heart  that  spoke.  What  did  it 
matter,  then,  that  she  lied  with  her  lips  ? 

"  I  did  the  same  thing  one  day  to  her,  and  I  saw 
that  it  made  her  happy. 

"  She  asked  me  in  a  somewhat  anxious,  waver- 
ing voice,  trembling  with  hidden  uneasiness  : 

"  *  Do  you  think  that  those  who  are  killed  in 
action  suffer  much,  even  if  they  don't  die  at 
once  ?  ' 


i66  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  I  looked  at  her  eyes.  They  were  pleading 
pathetically  for  a  '  No.' 

"  '  They  don't  suffer  at  all,  madam,'  I  said. 
'  Death  in  battle  is  an  easy  and  happy  death. 
They  pass  away  in  joy.  It  is  all  rapture  and 
exultation.  .  .  . ' 

"  She  looked  at  me  intently,  as  if  she  doubted 
for  a  moment  the  truth  of  my  words.  Then  a 
look  of  confident  happiness  passed  over  her 
face  and  as  she  pressed  my  hand,  she  said  : 

"  '  Yes  ;  it  is  so,  isn't  it  ?  They  pass  away 
in  rapture  and  joy.  It  always  makes  me  so 
happy.' 

"  After  I  had  been  a  couple  of  months  in  the 
hospital  I  was  allowed  to  rest  outside.  My  arm 
had  been  healed  some  time.  It  was  nervous 
trouble  that  kept  me  in  bed  and  in  the  sick- 
room. 

"  I  could  not  get  my  strength  back.  All  that 
I  gained  during  the  day  the  nights  took  away 
again  with  their  evil  dreams.  I  have  told  you 
about  them.  They  tore  at  one's  mind  with 
endless  brutality.  Shrieks  and  moans  and 
frightened  cries  might  be  heard  at  any  hour  of 
the  night  in  the  large  room. 

"  It  is  impossible  to  grasp  how  even  the 
smallest  event  sinks  into  one's  mind,  and  how 
even   one's   dream-life   can   find   them   all   out. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  167 

And  always  the  worst — always  the  most  pain- 
ful. 

"  My  first  day  outside  in  the  beautiful  park 
round  the  hospital  was  a  wonderful  experience. 

"  Simply  to  breathe  the  air — it  flowed  like  a 
hot  and  sweet  stream  into  my  lungs,  which  had 
for  so  long  been  filled  with  the  stench  of  iodine 
and  carbolic.  It  almost  hurt  me  to  breathe. 
I  swallowed  it  in  big  draughts  like  a  drunkard, 
until  I  was  nearly  giddy  and  ill. 

"  And  then  this  luxuriance  around  me — the 
colour  and  perfume  of  the  flowers,  the  warming 
sun  that  made  one  so  pleasantly  tired  ;  the 
mountains  with  their  look  of  fairy-tale  mystery, 
fading  away  in  distant  blue  shadows. 

"  Nothing  had  been  destroyed.  Nothing  had 
been  trampled  down.  Nothing  had  been  laid 
waste. 

"  Everywhere  was  blossoming  and  growing 
life,  tended  by  careful  hands,  cherished  with 
the  solicitude  of  a  lover. 

"  It  was  a  marvellous  contrast,  which  I  could 
hardly  grasp,  but  which  made  me  very  happy. 

"  I  spoke  very  little  to  my  comrades.  There 
was  enough  in  all  that  I  saw  about  me  to  fill 
my  mind  with  joy. 

"The  name  that  had  been  given  me,  *The 
Silent  Dane,'  followed  me  here  too.     It  was  the 


i68  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

nurse  who  told  me  one  day  when  calling  me 
by  it. 

"  I  could  not  avoid,  though,  seeing  the 
misery  about  me.  The  poor  blinded  ones, 
groping  their  way  and  leaning  on  the  arm  of  a 
comrade  or  a  nurse.  Young  men,  mere  children 
sometimes,  dragging  themselves  along  on  crutches 
or  hobbling  about  with  the  aid  of  two  sticks  on 
stiff,  limping  legs.  Men  tottering  about  on  two 
stumps  hardly  reaching  to  their  knees. 

"  But  why  go  into  further  details  about 
this  misery  ?  They  were  all  maimed  and 
crippled  :  people  who  were  marked  for  life — 
heroes  now — true  heroes.    But  for  how  long  ? 

"  The  day  is  bound  to  come  when  the  hero 
and  the  halo  about  his  name  have  faded  and  you 
will  see  in  him  who  suffered  for  his  country  only  a 
poor  cripple  who  awakens  your  pity  and  causes 
you  discomfort. 

"  Life  is  not  more  merciful  than  that,  and 
not  more  grateful. 

"  Yet  how  happy  they  all  were  !  Even  those 
who,  it  seemed  to  me,  were  nothing  but  absolute 
wrecks  and  of  no  good  whatever  any  more  in 
life.  They  chattered  like  children.  They  laughed. 
They  joked  like  irrepressible  boys.  They  sang. 
They  sat  on  the  benches  and  enjoyed  the  luxury 
of  letting  the  sun  bake  their  bodies. 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  169 

"  I  did  not  understand  them.  But  that  was  my 
fault,  of  course.     I  forgot  to  think  of  myself. 

"  For  what  was  I  but  such  another  poor 
cripple,  a  maimed  creature  that  would  perhaps 
never  accomplish  anything  of  value  in  life  when 
it  really  came  to  the  point. 

"  And  yet  I  was  happy  myself — fervently 
happy.  Why  deny  it  ?  And  I  longed  so  un- 
speakably for  the  day  when  I  was  to  see  my  own 
countryside  and  my  home  again. 

"  I  have  never  known  such  longing  as  I  had 
during  the  time  I  was  in  hospital. 

"  I  longed  like  a  child — to  tears,  sometimes. 

"  I  longed  for  everything  that  was  dear  to 
me  away  yonder  :  the  blue  fjord  ;  the  woods, 
the  farm,  and  the  garden  and  the  fields  ;  the 
language  ;   those  dear,  beautiful  sounds. 

"  First  and  last — those  dear,  beautiful  sounds  : 
my  mother-tongue  and  that  of  my  father  and 
my  forefathers. 

" '  Sweet  in  joy  and  sweet  in  sadness,'  as  we 
sing  and  croon  about  it." 

My  friend  looked  at  me  and  nodded  quietly. 

"  Ah,  well !  You  don't  understand  that, 
I  suppose.  Not  altogether,  at  any  rate,"  he 
added. 

"  I  earnestly  hope  you  may  never  come  to 
understand  it — as  we  do,^'* 


170  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

XII 

"The  day  I  went  home  was  terribly  long. 
It  seemed  to  me  as  if  my  journey  would  never 
come  to  an  end.  The  journey  was  painful, 
too,  as  well  as  long.  There  were  so  many  people 
who  asked  questions.  They  ferreted.  They 
persisted  in  their  ferreting  to  the  point  of 
impertinence.  And  those  who  did  not  ask 
questions  scrutinised  me  offensively  or  gave  me 
pitying  looks. 

"  At  last  I  had  to  shrink  into  a  corner  and 
pretend  to  be  both  deaf  and  blind,  to  escape 
from  all  that  inquisitiveness  and  that  obtrusive 
pity  which  I  found  so  extremely  objectionable. 

"  As  I  approached  my  home  country  and 
changed  on  to  the  little  crawling  local  railway, 
I  was  so  deeply  stirred  that  I  could  have  wept. 
My  lips  quivered  and  my  breast  was  as  empty 
as  if  all  the  air  had  been  pumped  out  of  my 
lungs. 

"  As  the  train  glided  into  the  small  station 
I  pulled  down  the  window  and  looked  out. 

"  It  was  all  so  joyously  familiar.  The  name 
with  the  foreign,  snarling  sound.  The  station- 
master,  erect  and  stiff,  like  the  old  non-commis- 
sioned officer  with  a  big  German  beard  that  he 
was.     The   flowers  on  the  window-sills  of  the 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  171 

station-house.  The  faces  of  the  station-master's 
wife  and  children  against  the  window-panes.  The 
smell  of  asphalte  from  the  sun-baked  platform. 

"  And  over  there — why,  that  was  my  father, 
my  dear,  dear  old  father  !  He  seemed  to  me 
to  have  aged  a  good  deal.  His  broad  back, 
which  before  had  been  so  straight  and  so  proudly 
erect,  was  bent  and  tired  ;  and  his  face  looked 
worn  as  if  after  a  long  illness. 

"  His  glance  went  down  the  train  from 
carriage  to  carriage.  I  waved  my  hand  to  him 
and  called  out : 

"  '  Father  ! ' 

"  He  turned  at  the  sound  and  stared  at  me  a 
moment. 

"  At  first  a  startled  look  seemed  to  pass  over 
his  face.  A  sudden  wonder,  as  when  you  see 
something  you  have  not  expected,  and  then  it 
seemed  to  me  that  he  tottered  backwards  a 
step  or  two  when  he  understood  who  it  was  that 
had  called.  He  bent  his  head  and  pressed 
his  hand  to  his  eyes. 

"  I  think  he  was  weeping. 

"Then  I  jumped  out  of  the  carriage,  and  the 
next  instant  I  was  beside  him. 

"  He  threw  his  arms  round  my  neck  and  kissed 
me  fervently  on  both  cheeks  as  he  whispered 
in  a  trembling  voice  : 


172  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  ^  Oh,  thank  God  we've  got  you  back  again ! 
Welcome  home,  my  dear  boy  —  welcome  — 
welcome  !  Thanks  be -to  God  from  your  mother 
and  me  and  all  of  us  1  0  my  God,  my  God  ! — 
it  has  been  a  hard  time  !  ' 

"  He  shook  me  as  you  shake  a  friend  in 
exuberant  joy.  And  then  he  took  my  arm. 
'  Why,  I  could  not  recognise  you  at  first,'  he 
said  with  a  little  smile.  '  You  have  changed 
— somewhat.  .  .  .  But  on  the  whole  you  are 
looking  quite  well.' 

"  '  Yes,  am  I  not  ?'  I   said.     '  Quite  well— 
I  think  so  myself.' 
,  "  I  smiled. 

"  I  remembered  that  that  was  what  they 
always  said  at  the  hospital. 

"  How  alike  words  are  when  they  are  meant 
to  comfort  and  cheer  !  How  simple  -  minded 
people  are — both  those  who  give  and  those  who 
receive  comfort  ! 

"  Then  we  drove  along  the  road  to  my  home, 
and  in  thirsty  eagerness  my  mind  drank  in  all 
the  old,  familiar  and  beautiful  luxuriance  : 
the  white  road  with  the  perfume  of  the  poplars  ; 
the  hedges  with  the  wild  roses  ;  the  white- 
washed, thatched  farmsteads  ;  the  bright, 
summer  gleam  of  the  blue  fjord. 

"  It  was  all  just  the  same  as  when  I  left  home 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  173 

nearly  two  years  ago — so  it  seemed  to  me,  at 
any  rate.    I  could  not  see  any  change. 

"  My  father  had  sat  silent  awhile  and  had 
now  and  then  stolen  a  glance  at  me,  and  I 
understood  why.  He  had  to  feel  at  home  with 
my  face  first  before  he  could  feel  quite  at  home 
with  myself.  He  was  never  at  any  time  one  to 
speak  much,  by  the  way. 

"  We  drove  past  one  of  the  big  farms.  The 
house  stood  close  up  to  the  road,  and  looked 
so  peaceful,  so  bathed  in  sunshine  ;  and  the 
blossoms  from  the  fruit  trees  sprinkled  their 
pure  white  snow  over  the  bright  lawns. 

"  '  The  farmer  in  there  fell  last  September,' 
said  my  father;  'and  his  two  sons  are  also 
gone.  There  are  no  more  men  left  now  in  that 
family.' 

"  I  turned  round  and  looked  towards  the  farm- 
stead. 

"  Was  not  the  blinking  of  the  sun  in  the  bright 
window-panes  like  the  brightness  of  eyes  dew^ed 
with  tears  ?  Did  not  the  sprinkled  apple- 
blossoms  on  the  bright  lawns  look  like  flowers 
on  freshly-dug  graves  ? 

"  It  seemed  so  to  me.  It  seemed  to  me  also 
that  the  country  looked  different  and  unfamiliar 
in  all  its  homeliness.  The  sunshine  and  luxuri- 
ance were  there  ;    the  woods  and  the  fjord  and 


174  FORCED  TO   FIGHT 

everything ;  the  old  farmsteads,  the  fertile 
fields  ;   and  yet  .  .  . 

''  Soon  after  we  were  up  on  a  hill  and  could 
see  far  away  over  the  countryside  and  out  to  the 
fjord  and  the  downs  on  the  other  side. 

"  My  father  sat  pointing  with  his  whip  to  the 
houses  and  farms  round  about. 

"  '  The  husband  is  gone  over  there,  and  yonder 
the  son.  Both  sons  from  that  place  are  gone. 
And  over  there  they  have  lost  a  son-in-law — 
you  know,  the  one  who  had  just  got  married. 
At  the  farm  yonder  the  husband  came  home  a 
cripple  last  Christmas  ;  and  the  son  in  that  one 
is  blind.' 

"  His  hushed  and  mournful  words  spoke  of 
nothing  but  death  and  grief.  There  was  scarcely 
a  farm  or  a  house  the  door  of  which  was  not 
marked  with  the  cross  of  death,  or  in  which 
mourning  or  disablement  had  not  a  home. 

"  I  looked  out  on  the  sunny  country.  Its 
colour  seemed  to  have  changed.  There  was 
plenty  of  sunshine,  but  there  was  no  joy  in  its 
radiance.  There  was  growth  and  luxuriance 
enough,  but  there  was  no  smile  on  its  opulent 
abundance. 

"  The  light  summer  breeze  played  amongst 
the  tops  of  the  poplars,  and  through  the  flower- 
ing hedgerows,  over  the  varying  chequers  of  the 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  175 

fields,  and  along  the  gaily-coloured  ditches  by 
the  wayside.  It  threw  stripes  on  the  blue  fjord 
and  frolicked  in  and  out  of  the  ripening  corn. 

"  But  it  was  not  like  the  cheery  humming 
of  the  summers  of  old. 

"  It  sounded  like  a  plaintive  sighing,  like  a 
fear-stricken  sobbing,  stealing  along  by  field  and 
farm  and  whispering  about  grief  and  want  and 
longing  to  every  blade  of  grass,  every  leaf,  every 
flower,  to  every  little  clucking  ripple  on  the  blue, 
shining  water. 

"  I  saw  it  so  distinctly  now  ;  and  I  under- 
stood it. 

'^  There  was  no  pageant  of  summer  here,  on 
this  countryside.  It  was  a  land  in  mourning. 
The  glitter  of  tears  was  in  the  gleams  of  the  sun, 
and  wailing  in  the  whispers  of  the  summer  breeze. 

"  It  was  not  joy  that  met  me  at  my  home- 
coming. It  was  not  my  old,  beautiful  country 
that  took  me  into  its  arms  with  a  smile.  It  was 
a  silent  and  weary  land,  in  which  there  was 
weeping  behind  closed  doors,  and  in  which  the 
nights  were  full  of  a  restless,  trembling  fear  and 
all  the  unfathomable  misery  of  a  terrible  and 
merciless  time. 

"  I  had  left  so  much  evil  and  misery  behind 
me  ;  I  had  come  home  to  still  greater  evils,  still 
deeper  misery. 


176  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  I  had  come  home  to  those  who  had  to  hear  the 
soTTOZOS.  And  that  is  harder,  infinitely  harder, 
than  to  suffer  death  or  see  others  suffer  it. 

"  For  sorrow  never  ceases.  There  are  always 
tears  in  its  eyes. 

"  As  we  drove  into  the  yard  I  caught  a  ghmpse 
of  my  mother  at  the  door,  but  she  disappeared 
again,  before  I  had  had  time  to  nod  to  her. 

"  M-Y  fiancee  was  standing  in  the  middle  of  the 
yard.  Her  face  had  not  the  same  bright  gentle- 
ness as  before.  About  her  features  and  on  her 
lips  there  were  the  same  sad  and  mournful  lines 
that  I  had  sn  oeen  the  faces  of  the  women  in  the 
hospital.  She,  too,  was  stamped  with  the  daily 
silent  longing  and  uncertainty,  the  nightly  dread 
and  heart-ache. 

"  She  seemed  to  me  to  look  old.  And  she  was 
not  yet  twenty-two. 

"  She  threw  her  arms  round  my  neck,  almost 
before  I  had  reached  the  ground.  She  said 
nothing.  She  only  cried,  clinging  closely  to  me 
and  hiding  her  face  on  my  shoulder. 

"  '  Well,  you  can  recognise  him,  it  seems,' 
said  my  father.  '  It  was  all  I  could  do — just 
at  first.  .  .  .  ' 

"  She  looked  at  me,  and  then  turned  to  my 
father  as  she  said  : 

"  '  I  knew  that  he  would  look  like  that — that 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  177 

was  how  I  always  saw  him.  In  my  thoughts 
by  day  and  my  dreams  at  night.' 

"  Then  we  went  into  the  sitting-room. 

"  My  mother  was  standing  by  the  table.  She 
was  pale  and  there  was  a  frightened  and 
despairing  look  in  her  eyes. 

"  She  gazed  at  me  for  a  moment  as  if  in  terror. 
Then  she  sank  down  upon  a  chair  and  hid  her 
face  in  her  hands. 

"  '  Is  that  my  boy — is   that   my   boy  ?  .  .  . ' 

"  It  sounded  like  a  heart-broken  wailing.  I 
saw  that  she  was  sobbing.  I  perceived  that  my 
face  had  frightened  her  ;    the  empty  sleeve  too. 

"  I  went  over  and  knelt  down  before  her, 
putting  my  arm  round  her  waist  and  my  head 
in  her  lap. 

"  I  had  always  done  that  as  a  boy  when  she 
was  grieved  about  anything. 

"  Then  I  felt  her  hand  gently  stroking  my 
head.  How  soft  that  hand  was  I  What  a  bliss- 
fulness  there  was  in  that  quiet,  gentle  stroking  ! 

"  Is  there  anybody  who  knows  how  to  caress 
like  a  mother  ?  Is  there  anything  in  the  world 
that  holds  such  rapturous  joy  ?  .  .  . 

"  After  a  little  while  she  took  my  chin  in  her 
hands  and  raised  my  head.  Our  eyes  met. 
Hers  were  soft  and  shining  —  a  fathomless  deep 
of  love  to  gaze  into. 

F.r,  H 


178  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

'^  Her  face  was  grey  and  there  was  a  quivering 
about  her  firmly-closed  lips.  But  I  could  see 
that  she  was  happy  —  silently,  speechlessly 
happy. 

"  I  felt  her  lips  on  my  forehead.  It  was  like 
a  great  solemnity  to  me.  And  then  she  said  in 
a  soft  whisper : 

"  '  My  own  big  boy — my  own  big  boy — thank 
God  for  ever  that  I  have  you  back  again  ! ' 

"  A  sad  little  smile  passed  over  her  face,  and, 
as  if  she  felt  a  desire  to  say  something  showing 
a  little  of  her  warm-hearted  and  charming 
humour,  she  added  between  smiles  and  tears  : 

"  ^  But  you  are  not  such  a  handsome  boy  as 
when  you  went  away.' 

"  Then  she  broke  down  and  bent  her  face  over 
mine. 

''  That  was  my  home-coming.  I  had  looked 
forward  to  it  and  it  had  given  me  all  the  happi- 
ness I  could  wish  for.  It  was  neither  boisterous 
nor  efiusive.  It  was  wrapped  in  sadness.  But 
it  held  all  the  deep  and  calm  affection  that  needs 
no  other  expression  than  a  glance  or  the  stroking 
of  a  trembhng  hand  to  find  its  way  to  the  best 
and  richest  depths  in  one's  heart. 

"  In  other  ways,  however,  I  had  not  come 
home  to  happiness. 

"  It  was  a  grief-laden  country  and  a  grief- 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  179 

laden  people.  I  am  certain  there  was  not  one 
home  in  which  there  was  not  weeping  over  a 
life  that  had  been  taken,  or  a  body  that  had  been 
maltreated. 

"  And  at  the  same  time  there  was  extreme 
distress. 

"  What  were  they  to  do  in  all  the  little  poverty- 
stricken  homes  that  had  lost  their  bread-winner  ? 
They  could  only  suffer.  They  could  do  nothing 
but  sit  day  after  day  with  tear-laden  eyes  and 
stare  into  a  misery  that  grew  deeper  and  deeper 
and  more  and  more  hopeless. 

"  People  helped  them  as  well  as  they  could. 
They  comforted  each  other,  and  did  their  best 
in  kind  words  and  friendly  gifts.  But  it  was  only 
a  poor  consolation  for  all  that  had  been  lost. 

"  And  no  one  could  do  anything  for  the  long, 
sleepless  nights  and  the  grief-laden  days. 

"  Sometimes  I  went  with  my  father  to  visit 
a  little  cottage  near  by.  We  knew  the  people, 
as  both  the  husband  and  wife  had  been  in  our 
service  some  years  before.  But  the  man  had  been 
at  the  front  since  the  beginning  of  the  war,  and 
the  wife  had  to  look  after  everything  at  home, 
including  his  mother,  who  was  old  and  an  invalid. 

"  The  old  grandmother  sat  in  her  corner  all 
day  long  reading  her  Bible,  a  wedding  gift  with 
silver  clasps,  and  there  were  not  many  hours  in 


i8o  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

the  day  when  the  tears  did  not  well  up  in  the 
young  wife's  eyes. 

"  How  she  would  gaze  at  her  boy  sometimes  ! 
It  looked  as  if  she  were  seeking  in  his  face  com- 
pensation for  him  whose  fate  was  never  out  of 
her  thoughts. 

"  I  can  imagine  her  nights,  how  each  waking 
minute  would  be  a  prayer  for  him  and  his  life — 
she  told  me  so  later.  She  had  prayed  in  deepest 
anguish  ;  and  every  time  she  looked  at  me,  and 
the  marks  of  war  I  carried  upon  me,  a  shudder 
of  horror  ran  through  her. 

"  It  was  not  always  death,  perhaps,  that  she 
dreaded  most.  It  was  the  uncertainty  that 
tormented  her.  The  sufferings  he  might  have 
to  endure.  The  pain  he  might  have  to  bear. 
And  this — that  perhaps  he  would  be  buried  in  the 
soil  of  a  strange  land,  without  her  ever  being 
told  where. 

"  There  had  been  one  single  card  from  him 
from  the  Eastern  front.  He  was  quite  well,  he 
said,  and  was  in  good  spirits. 

"  It  was  his  first  and  last  greeting. 

"  That  was  how  the  days  went  by  in  that 
home.  There  was  quiet  whispering  about  the 
day's  work,  and  then  silence.  Their  fear  was 
never  put  into  words,  but  they  understood  each 
other  just  the  same.    In  little  pressures  of  hands 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  i8i 

when  they  passed  each  other  they  gave  the  Httle 
comfort  that  warmed  their  hearts  and  soothed 
them  a  little  while. 

"Then  one  afternoon  my  father  and  I  were 
sitting  with  them. 

"  We  sat  looking  out  at  the  fields,  bathed  in 
sunshine,  at  the  twisting  road,  gleaming  white 
against  the  green. 

"  It  had  been  very  lonely  on  the  road  all  day. 
Altogether  it  was  always  lonely  on  the  roads. 

"  While  we  were  sitting  there  we  saw  the  village 
magistrate  coming  up,  walking  heavily,  as  he 
had  done  of  late.  He  had  to  bring  so  many  sad 
messages. 

"  When  the  young  wife  saw  him  coming  she 
jumped  up  with  a  start  and  held  her  hand  to  her 
heart,  and  her  face  turned  sallow  and  pale. 

"  '  It's  coming  now,'  she  whispered.  '  It's 
coming.' 

"  The  old  grandmother  looked  fixedly  at  her 
from  her  corner. 

"  '  What  is  coming  ?  '  she  asked.  But  she 
got  no  answer. 

"  Then  the  young  woman  turned  to  the  door. 
Her  eyes  stared,  like  those  of  one  who  sees  every- 
thing about  him  falling  into  ruins,  and  she 
pressed  her  clenched  hands  to  her  temples. 

"  We  could  hear  the  rattling  of  the  latch  on 


i82  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

the  outer  door,  but  we  did  not  move.  We  sat 
silent  with  bated  breath.  There  were  heavy 
footsteps  in  the  passage,  and  we  heard  the  quiet 
clearing  of  a  throat. 

"  The  next  moment  the  magistrate  opened  the 
door  and  came  into  the  room. 

"  The  young  wife  stretched  her  hands  out  to 
him  as  if  in  prayer.  She  wanted  to  ask  him  a 
question.  But  the  words  could  not  find  their 
way  through  her  lips.  He  was  silent,  too,  as  he 
looked  across  at  the  old  grandmother,  gazing 
up  from  her  Bible. 

"  She  passed  her  hands  quietly  over  her  eyes, 
and  as  a  look  of  quavering  fear  came  into  the 
old,  life-worn  face  she  asked  : 

"  '  Is  Hans  .  .  .  ?  ' 

"  She  said  no  more.  Then  the  young  wife 
moved  heavily,  almost  fainting,  across  the  floor, 
fell  on  her  knees  before  her  mother-in-law,  and 
hid  her  face  against  the  Bible  lying  in  her  lap. 

"  Standing  beside  the  door  the  magistrate 
whispered  : 

"  '  Yes,  he  is — a  long  time  ago — in  Russia.' 

"  My  father  drew  the  boy  close  to  him  and 
patted  his  cheek.  He  looked  up  with  frightened 
eyes,  and  then  his  glance  went  to  his  mother  and 
his  grandmother,  who  whispered,  as  she  stroked 
the  hair  of  her  daughter-in-law  : 


FORCED  TO  FIGHT  183 

"  '  The  Lord  gave — the  Lord  hath  taken. 
The  Lord  gave — the  Lord  hath  taken.' 

"  I  can  see  it  all  before  me  still,"  my  friend 
said  quietly.  "  I  think  I  would  rather  go  through 
the  horrors  of  war  again  than  the  hours  of  grief 
that  came  after  them. 

"  After  all,  is  there  anything  sadder  than  this 
— that  one  whom  you  have  loved  with  all  your 
heart  has  been  swept  away  like  a  straw  before 
the  wind  ? 

"  It  meant  so  infinitely  much  for  one — so 
infinitely  little  for  the  whole. 

"  That  is  only  one  little  picture  from  my 
countryside.  But  Hke  many  others  it  is  deeply 
engraved  in  my  mind.  And  it  is  filled  with 
the  same  pain. 

"  And,  taking  it  altogether,  what  sort  of  a 
generation,  I  wonder,  will  it  be  that  survives 
the  war  in  my  old  country  ?  There  will  not  be 
a  single  joy  left  for  it.  There  will  not  be  one 
single  smile  of  happiness. 

"  Every  home  will  have  the  memory  of  its 
dead  to  cherish.  Every  home  will  have  its  heavy 
sorrows  to  bear.  And  none  of  them  have  that 
great  and  beautiful  background  of  suffering  that 
reconciles  one  both  to  grief  and  death-^or 
that  softens  them,  at  least. 


1 84  FORCED  TO  FIGHT 

"  All  of  them  live  and  suffer  there,  under  the 
hard  yoke  of  duty.  There  is  a  halo  of  glory  about 
many  names,  but  there  are  also  streams  of  tears. 

"  And  the  lives  of  the  future  have  to  be  lived 
under  the  pressure  of  all  the  horrors  they  have 
had  to  see  and  endure.  It  will  be  a  generation 
with  sad  hearts  and  many  diseased  thoughts — 
both  among  those  who  were  in  the  war^and  came 
through  it  as  well  as  among  those  who  were  at 
home. 

"An  impoverished  generation — a  joy-forsaken 
generation. 

"  They  called  me  ^  The  Silent  Dane.' 

"  They  were  right. 

"  But  all  the  others — what  about  them  ?  I 
wonder  if  they  will  not  be  called  by  that  name, 
too  ?    I  think  so. 

"  I  think  there  will  be  great  and  inconsolable 
silence  where  there  was  before  so  much  strength, 
so  much  happiness,  so  much  faith,  and  so  many 
fair  hopes. 

"  '  The  Silent  Dane.' 

"  Isn't  it  so  ?  I  think  that  is  the  name  they 
should  all  have. 

"  For  memory  needs  quiet  for  its  happiness. 
And  great  sorrows  have  no  words." 

THE  WHITEFRIARS   PRESS,   LTD.,   LONDON   AND   TONBRIDGE. 


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